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 ilo and Stitch" is a new animation film from the
house of the Mouse (re: Walt Disney). As such, it has all the trademarks and "touches" of the Mouse, namely manipulation of emotions, a loud soundtrack
that's been pre-planned to sell albums, and outstanding animation that took
years to make.
All of that is here, but you know what? So what. No one
does animation better than the Mouse, and they've created yet another great
film in "Lilo and Stitch," the kind that will appeal to both kids and
adults.
One of the two titular characters of "Lilo and Stitch"
is Lilo, a lonely but highly imaginative Hawaiian girl living on an island with
her sister, Nani (voice by Tia Carrere). The duo's life is not exactly serene,
as Lilo is forever lonely, unable to cope with having lost her parents, unable
to make friends (she bites one of them), and her life with big sis is precarious
at best since the State of Hawaii is looking for a reason – any reason – to
take her away. Things don't get better when Stitch, an alien lab experiment
built to be mischievous (and oh my does he excel at it) and supposed to be
destroyed, escapes his captors, steals a ship, and crashlands on Lilo's
island.
"Lilo and Stitch" relies on cell animation and
backgrounds done with watercolors. The images have that traditional look and
feel, and the character designs are well done and realistic. Nani and Lilo,
along with the other Hawaiians, are appropriately dark-skinned, dark-haired, and
easily contrasted against the white-skinned and out of shape tourists that dot
the island. The movie also does a good job of showing the new (and only)
industry for Hawaiians – serving and entertaining not-so-bright mainlanders.
For an animation,
"Lilo and Stitch" is surprisingly
very adult. The subject of Nani's struggles to keep her sister despite all the
odds is quite touching. Lilo (voiced by Daveigh Chase) is very human, and her
loneliness is so realistic that I was sometimes surprised I was seeing these
situations and hearing this type of dialogue in a cartoon. And from the
Mouse no less, a company known for sugarcoating everything with cute animals
that sings at the drop of a hat.
That doesn't mean "Lilo and Stitch" is completely
without the cute factor. You can't have a Disney film without cute. It's
like asking Laurel to go on stage without Hardy, or Abbot without Costello, or
peanut butter without jelly – you get the idea. Anyone stepping into a Disney
film not expecting cute is seriously in need of some movie IQ, or a good shrink.
The inescapable and overwhelming presence of cuteness
aside, "Lilo and Stitch" resonates as a surprisingly serious animation at
times, and at other times it's nothing more than a silly alien chase film
meant to keep the kids in the theaters happy. When the aliens land on Earth in
pursuit of Stitch, they have no trouble finding him. The mischievous Stitch, who
was invented to create mischief on a large city populace, realizes he has to
lower his standards when he finds himself on this small, lightly populated
Hawaiian island. The scene where he realizes this is quite funny.
The aliens' hunt for Stitch is actually the weakest
element of the movie, and I couldn't help but wonder if the movie might not
have been better served if the alien bounty hunters were taken out completely in
favor of more scenarios involving Stitch and the sisters. After one of
Stitch's stunts get Nani fired from her job, she's forced to find a new one,
and there's a sequence where she goes job-hunting and lying her you-know-what
off. All the while Stitch is in the background ruining all her would-be job
prospects.
I do foresee a slight problem with the film. The character
of Stitch might be a little hard to take at first, since he comes across as too
much of a bully, especially toward the little Lilo. The little alien furball
pushes Lilo around, grabs her bed when she tries to make him sleep in the little
doggy bed, and at one point completely trashes her house. But to the lonely
Lilo, whose best friend pre-Stitch is a voodoo doll she created herself, Stitch
is a Godsend. Since this is a Mouse film, Stitch eventually warms to Lilo. What,
did you think he wouldn't?
"Lilo and Stitch" is a joy for kids, and adults won't
feel left out. It's highly manipulative, the music works, and the aliens are
sometimes a little too "cartoonish." It should also be noted that
kids who see the movie will get a lesson about the real world and how hard it is
to survive out there – all of this without them ever knowing a lesson was in
progress. How sneaky is that? Then again, no one does sneaky better than the
Mouse.
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