Zootopia (2016) - Disney's ambitious, edifying, family-minded 3D animation

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Many of the colorful central characters of Byron Howard, Rich Moore and Jared Bush's Zootopia are gathered on this poster for the film

Our hero is a young female rabbit, the first rabbit police recruit ever, who arrives in the major animal city with a head full of dreams, which is put to the test by reality as it is, along with a complex missing animals case that she takes upon herself, partnering with her a scheming fox.

Zootopia is another irresistible hit from Disney. This one is written by co-writer-co-director Jared Bush (Moana (2016)) and Phil Johnston (Cedar Rapids (2011)), with Jennifer Lee (Frozen (2013)), Josie Trinidad (How to Hook Up Your Home Theater (2007), short) and Jim Reardon (WALL-E (2008)) contributing story elements, and directed by Bush, Byron Howard (Tangled (2010)) and Rich Moore (Wreck-It Ralph (2012)). Perhaps due to the many good heads involved, Zootopia is rife with creative energy, thoughtful decisions and a wide array of funny and exciting ideas.
The animation is astoundingly handsome and detailed, and Ginnifer Goodwin (Robot Chicken (2005-14)), Jason Bateman (The Family Fang (2015)), Idris Elba (The Losers (2010)), Jenny Slate (Gifted (2017)) and Nate Torrence (Weird Loners (2015), TV-series) give outstanding voice performances. Zootopia, in quite the scoop, also has Shakira voicing and singing the Gazelle pop star of the film, and Shakira's world-famous, positive image and her song here (Try Everything) fit like a glove with the film's idealistic morals: Embracing a modern, multi-cultural society, tolerance, diversity seen as a strength and peaceful co-existence, and against racism, fear-mongering - and drugs, which this ambitious, political family adventure also manages to warn against.
Zootopia is a special, very socially oriented animated crime drama, which also works through artfully executed single scenes, just the right amount of chase-and-escape action scenes, and a host of fun and terrific characters.

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Byron Howard: Bolt (2008) - Hollywood dog road adventure fun for the whole family!
Rich Moore: Wreck-It Ralph (2012) - Original story gets lost in benign but overly flashy animation

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 150 mil. $
Box office:1,023.7 mil. $
= Huge hit
[Zootopia premiered 11 February (Denmark) and runs 108 minutes. Research was done in two US animal parks as well as in Kenya for the many animals of the film, their movement and looks, and new ground was broken in terms of details in the rendition of fur in the animation. The production took place in a makeshift warehouse in North Hollywood, as Disney Animation's Burbank HQ was under renovation. The film opened #1 in 2D, 3D and IMAX to a great 75 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it remained #1 for 3 consecutive weeks and stayed in the top 5 for an incredible 8 weeks and grossed 341.2 mil. $ (33.3 % of the total gross). It was Disney Animation's biggest opening in North America to date, the biggest March animation opening to date and the 7th highest-grossing film in the market of the year. Its 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were China with 235.5 mil. $ (23 %), - where it became the highest-grossing animation of all time, the first animation to break 200 mil. $ and the second highest-grossing film of the year (behind The Mermaid), - and Japan with 70.1 mil. $ (6.8 %). Worldwide, the film was the 4th highest-grossing of the year (behind Captain America: Civil War, Rogue One and Finding Dory) and the 2nd highest-grossing animation (behind Finding Dory). It also ranks as the second highest-grossing original film of all time (behind Avatar (2009)) and the 5th highest-grossing animation of all time. The film's net profit has been estimated to be 294.9 mil. $ by Deadline.com. The film won the Best Animation Oscar (beating Kubo and the Two Strings, Moana, My Life as a Zucchini and The Red Turtle). It also won a Golden Globe, was nominated for a BAFTA and a Grammy and won an AFI award, among many other honors. A sequel is in talks. Zootopia was the year's second-highest ranking title at Rotten Tomatoes (after Moonlight); it is certified fresh at 98 % with an 8/10 critical average.]

What do you think of Zootopia?

Wreck-It Ralph (2012) - Original story gets lost in benign but overly flashy animation

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The festive poster with kapow value for Rich Moore's Wreck-It Ralph

 

Ralph (John C. Reilly (Chicago (2002))), the arcade computer game character of the game Wreck-It Ralph, is tired of being a lonely outsider in his world, who only gets to smash things to smithereens. So he leaves his game to win a medal. - But his decision lands everyone else in the arcade game world in deep trouble!

 

Wreck-It Ralph begins as a fresh, original and really funny idea. But it later turns out to have some real problems: Sarah Silverman's (Masters of Sex (2014-16)) girly character and the villain King Candy (voiced by Alan Tudyk (Wonder Boys (2000))) are both boring, and it is as though Wreck-It Ralph gets lost in the candy world which much of it plays out in. It indulges in flashy animation for its own sake and attempts to pull an edifying story out of the mess in the end, which as a result feels cheap.

Before this meltdown, though, Wreck-It Ralph provides enough lavish and computer game-enthusiastic fun to make it worth seeing. Jane Lynch (Rio (2011)) and Jack McBrayer (Bad Night (2015)) are both fun, with the latter building on his Southern-charm trademark.

The film is written by Phil Johnston (Zootopia (2016)) and Jennifer Lee (Frozen (2013)) and directed by feature-debuting Rich Moore (Zootopia).

 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: 165 mil. $

Box office: 471.2 mil. $

= Box office success

[Wreck-It Ralph premiered October 29 (El Capitan Theatre, Hollywood) and runs 101 minutes. The concept for Wreck-It Ralph was developed first by Disney in the late 1980s, and was redeveloped and reconsidered several times before the film that came to be. Moore was hired based on his previous work directing animated TV-series such as The Simpsons (1990-93)) and Futurama (1999-01)). Wreck-It Ralph contains an estimated 188 individual character cameos from a wide variety of real and imaginary computer-games. The film opened #1 to a 49 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it stayed in the top 5 for a total of 3 weeks and grossed 189.4 mil. $ (40.2 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were the UK with 36.1 mil. $ (7.7 %) and Japan with 29.6 mil. $ (6.3 %). Wreck-It Ralph was the 14th highest-grossing film and the 4th highest-grossing animation of the year. Roger Ebert gave it 3/4 stars, equal to a notch better than this review. The film was Oscar-nominated for Best Animated Feature, which it lost to Brave, and for the same Golden Globe, also lost. A sequel is in the works for a 2017 release. Wreck-It Ralph is certified fresh at 86 % with a 7.6 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Wreck-It Ralph?