Moana is Less-ana
If you're going to tell a boring story in film, you might as well include boring musical numbers. So at least 2016's Moana is consistent. Released the same year as Zootopia, it differs in quality to an astonishing degree, which may not be too surprising since it comes from a completely different creative team. Though it was directed by Ron Clements and John Musker, who'd delivered quality films for Disney in the past, including The Little Mermaid. In retrospect, the Disney Renaissance may have owed more to the songs composed by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman. Moana is usually compared to Pocahontas but you can also look at it as an inverse of The Little Mermaid--it's about a human princess who wants to go to sea instead of a mermaid princess who wants to walk on land. This comparison easily illustrates why The Little Mermaid succeeds so well where Moana fails: the songs were better, the story was more romantic, and the voice actress was better.
I heard Moana was a somewhat rushed production which would explain why it often feels like an outline or illustrated notes. I remember reading about Polynesian navigation techniques in oceanography class and it truly is fascinating. But this, along with aspects of Polynesian culture, are explained to the audience without feeling really lived in.
Maui, voiced ably enough by Dwayne Johnson, is the film's strongest asset. A lovable rogue sort of character, he's based on a trickster god from Polynesian folklore. We know he was a trickster god because one of the musical numbers awkwardly tells us this. I'm not sure if it's Lin-Manuel Miranda's deficiencies as a songwriter or the film's dry, exposition heavy tendencies that make the songs so lifeless or if it was a perfect storm of mediocrity. In any case, the songs never quite seem to get to a melody, often coming across as intros to songs that never get started.
But, yes, Maui gets all the personality Moana herself is denied and his "Your Welcome" song at least has some attitude. Though the scene where he urinates on Moana's hand was a bit tonally strange for a Disney film. Certainly it's a first for a Disney princess. It's not really funny and it's slightly creepy, like the man who suddenly tries to grope a female coworker at a Christmas party. Considering how much goes to committee at Disney, it's really remarkable this got through. The look on Maui's face when he does it certainly isn't endearing.
But while Moana's character design is sexy enough she doesn't seem to respond sexually to Maui or anyone else. Her voice actress, Auli'i Cravalho, in her first role, has the tinny sound of an average high school drama club performer.
The driving force of the narrative is a magic stone, a heart stolen by Maui from a mother island, the absence of which causes a gradually spreading blight. So it's basically the Sampo. Moana's father (Temuera Morrison) is chief and fiercely against the idea of anyone venturing past the coral reef around their island that has so far been spared the effects of the blight. When the island's food sources do start to become scarce, it's odd that only Moana still argues for going past the reef.
Her "I want" song comes separate from this, though, basically being about her desire to explore, very similar to, but vastly inferior to, Ariel's "Part of Your World". It's also not so different from Belle's desire to escape her little town. But like Ariel and Belle, the fulfillment of Moana's desire is oddly muted, being eclipsed by other plot elements introduced. The finale borrows heavily from Princess Mononoke but without the rumination on the balance between nature and human ingenuity that drives Princess Mononoke. At most, Moana just seems to be saying it's good to have a heart but not to exhibit too much passion, especially not with melody.
Moana is available on Disney+.
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This is part of a series of posts I'm writing on the Disney animated canon.
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
Pinocchio
Fantasia
Dumbo
Bambi
Saludos Amigos
The Three Caballeros
Make Mine Music
Fun and Fancy Free
Melody Time
The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad
Cinderella
Alice in Wonderland
Peter Pan
Lady and the Tramp
Sleeping Beauty
101 Dalmatians
The Sword in the Stone
The Jungle Book
The Aristocats
Robin Hood
The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
The Rescuers
The Fox and the Hound
The Black Cauldron
The Great Mouse Detective
Oliver & Company
The Little Mermaid
The Rescuers Down Under
Beauty and the Beast
Aladdin
The Lion King
Pocahontas
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Hercules
Mulan
Tarzan
Fantasia 2000
Dinosaur
The Emperor's New Groove
Atlantis: The Lost Empire
Lilo and Stitch
Treasure Planet
Brother Bear
Home on the Range
Chicken Little
Meet the Robinsons
Bolt
The Princess and the Frog
Tangled
Winnie the Pooh
Wreck-It Ralph
Frozen
Big Hero 6
Zootopia