Moana has always been drawn to the Ocean but her father has done everything in his power to prevent her from getting very far in it. Her Grandmother has other plans though, when Moana must realize her destiny to find Maui and stop the curse.
Now a lot of hype has been placed around this film since its release, I didn’t rush out to see it straight away. But a positive that it has had later screenings on at the cinema. The main problem when a film has huge hype it then leaves you feeling rather disappointed as you always expect and want more. I thought I should mention that at the start of the review as that is how I have ended up with this film.
Disney has always had a formula that works with a strong female leading character, I am trying to stay clear of Princess as in this case Moana is the Chief’s daughter. It certainly does fit within the latest style as well with Brave, Tangled and Frozen. Moana is a fantastic character and really does make you believe that you can achieve anything you want as long as you try very hard and put a lot of effort in with it.
It also had a scene that really made me fill up with tears and I found it to be very emotional. It involved Moana and her Grandmother, it was just a little bit too close and real and actually brought a tough memory back to myself. Which I guess shows that animated films can be just as powerful as any other film that you will watch. That I guess is what really develops the character and sets up the rest of the story.
My main problem and disappointed really came with the songs that were in the film as I felt they were very weak and just lacked the cutting edge that so many of the previous films have really been known for. Unless anyone thinks I should give them another chance and listen to the soundtrack? I am a little dubious with that though as I remember Let It Go being just incredible in Frozen and linking with Musical Theatre.
Maui was not a nice character to begin with but you just know he will grow on you and when it really matters he will eventually make the right decision to really help out. That was another decent thing about the film in all honesty, voiced by The Rock so what could really go wrong with that?
While we get some very good characters and seeing them grow from start to finish, the story doesn’t really have a massive amount to go along with it which was a little bit of a shame and as I mentioned earlier the songs weren’t the best. This really is one of those moments when a film has been hyped up a lot and then failed to deliver, I hadn’t actually read full reviews but saw a lot of positive tweets about the film and then checking the ratings on different websites. But that is ok as it is a good adventure and maybe just maybe I would have had a different view if I saw it earlier!
