LogFAQs > #975100906

26. Strange World

Inviso: 7
Karo: 12
Johnbobb: 17
Mythiot: 24
Suprak: 24
Plasma: 26
Red: 26
Ermine: 27
Evillord: 28

Total: 191

Inviso: Im honestly disappointed in Disney for not advertising this more (and seeming to leave it to die in theaters), because this was a genuinely solid movie. I liked Atlantis and I LOVED Treasure Planet, and this felt right in-line with those two as just a fun adventure movie. It had that 1950s serial adventure tone to it, complete with the Clade theme song, but I love the fact that you start of with the adventurer and his less-adventurous son, the son finds success on his own, only to hear the call of adventure once more as all of his hard work is in jeopardy. But more than that, I love the idea of this film exploring a strange, bright and colorful world, only to realize that its more Fantastic Voyage than anything else. All of the visuals you saw throughout the film come back in a completely different light when you realize the movie is taking place inside this giant organism. That, to me, really helped sell the film. Im also always a sucker for father/son relationships in Disney films, and this is that twice over, so thats a big deal.
I just feel the need to add one more note though, regarding the movies performance at the box office. I hate the fact that Disney has had so many movies that brag the first gay X, when its some background character that they can easily cut out of the film to appease hatemongers. But this film has not just a gay main character, but also a loving interracial couple as another pair of main characters. It manages to be woke without coming across as heavy-handed, or just trying to pander or anything like that. The characters are who they are, and things are shown, not told, and the end result is a likable cast overall. Its just really disappointing that Disney had so little faith in this one and threw it to the wolves the way they did. Its not a bad movie. Not the best, but definitely not bad. I mean, its pretty high on MY list, and I have only 5 films left.

Karo: The legendary Claude family, known both for their knack for adventure and being ignorant boomers, set out on an expedition into a mysterious system of underground caverns in order to protect their way of life.
Conflict soon arises between the grandpa (who wants to set fire to everything he doesn't understand), the father (who wants his son to be just like him, and is also afraid of everything he doesnt understand), and the son, who is thoughtful, independent and frustrated that nobody seems to understand his generation.
This heavy handed approach goes for the low hanging fruit and tries to make me hate the patriarchs of the Claude family for laughs, but they succeed far too well and I am just annoyed by these two characters throughout the whole runtime of the movie due to their egomaniacal arrogance and their seeming inability to comprehend any of Ethan's mouth noises.
So the world they live turns out to actually be a giant creature, something they shamelessly stole from Xenoblade while hoping people wouldnt realize and would think they were being super cool and original. The three generations of Claudes then patch things up in a very standard feel good kind of ending. Yay.
In many ways the movie reminds me of the adventure movies of the Disney dark era (Atlantis, Treasure Planet), and though Strange World is vastly superior to those films it still steps into some of the same pitfalls. Namely, too heavy of focus on the setting, and subsequent neglect of the cast of characters, because I honestly can't think of a more forgettable group of people in the whole modern Disney era than the Claude family. I mean its cool we got our first openly gay Disney protagonist, but why does he have to be just so... boring?
Strange World is a perfectly 'fine' movie with a good message about keeping an open mind, but in terms of the Disney revival era that is actually quite low and I can't help see this as a misstep from the studio.

Johnbobb: This film would've benefitted a LOT by losing about a solid 20 or so minutes. I enjoyed it a decent but, but it absoluitely dragged at times in the middle, despite almost always being visually interesting to look at. I enjoyed the characters and the intergenerational struggles they presented. What the film did best was in how it handled that dynamic, with each generation (while usually being well-intentioned) usually refusing to acknowledge the perspective of the generations to come after. I rolled my eyes at the opening "I'm not you, dad" scene but thought to myself that at least we got it out of the way early instead of having it be the peak of the conflict like so many movies before it. And then it does it again at the peak of the conflict anyway. Not the most original story but far from the worst and overall an enjoyable time

Mythiot: *no writeup submitted*

Suprak: *no writeup submitted*

Plasma: Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, minus the charm, conflict, and suspense. Aside from a poignant father-son moment near the end, Strange World plays everything ridiculously safe and delivers little beyond its vivid visuals.
Also Did I really watch a scene where a blob creature escapes a locked closet, unlocks the door, and then returns back inside so a dog can open the door instead? Seriously?

Red: I really don't want to get into it too deeply, but I'm kind of sad this movie bombed so hard because this is absolutely being used for nefarious means. The movie is just bad, it shouldn't be blamed on inclusion or anything like that. I tried to rewatch this film for this list, I just couldn't do it. Its boring, every attempt pretty much resulted in immediate sleep. I'm not sure what they thought they were selling, but with how animation has advanced and with so many different "strange world" movies already out there, the world itself needed to be interesting to be a draw. Instead the world just has a giant wall and generic weird creatures; they don't bring much to the table. It is being explored, also not bringing much to the table. But at the core we're just getting doubled up on the parent/child conflict, which if you look at this list animation is already full up on that regard. We know how this story ends before it begins, none of the family is a villain so they are all going to come to understand each others differences and get along hurray. So we're rehashing what everyone else has already been doing in a world that never amounts to more than strangely boring. Oh and it was all just an allegory for fossil fuels or some sort of climate change thing. I'm sure this was well intentioned but it feels shoehorned in to give the film a larger purpose that also never amounts to being particularly interesting. Strange World was very well-intentioned but also doesn't dispel doubts that Disney's creative juices are currently running on empty.