REVIEW: Moana tells inspiring feminist story
It is easy to envy the little girls growing up under this new vein of animated Disney movies where archery is a vital skill, sisterhood replaces true love’s kiss and a teenage girl sails into the unknown to bring hope back to her kingdom. In Brave, Frozen and now Moana, there is no more talk of girls being saved — instead, girls are the ones doing the saving: heroines whose curiosity, loyalty and sense of adventure are bigger than any hero. Directed by Ron Clements and John Musker, Moana, the most recent example of this important trend, surmounts the rest.
More colorful, more fun, the protagonist more fearless than ever before, Moana takes its genre and stretches it as far as it can go, seizing the hearts and eyes of viewers along the way. Complete with sparkling visuals, soaring and bouncing musical numbers and a tale of boundless female energy and adventure, Moana is an unforgettable voyage for moviegoers of all ages.
Moana is a Pacific Islander, the daughter of the chief of Motunui island. The movie begins with the flora and fauna of Motunui falling into despair, a curse set in place when a demigod named Maui stole the heart of the Pacific’s mother island and lost it to the ocean. In this movie, the ocean is a character, too, and it delivers this heart — a sparkling, green stone — to Moana when she was a little girl.
At 15 years old, Moana (Auli’i Cravalho) lives with her parents and grandmother on Motunui, which she knows she will one day inherit as chief. For as long as she can remember, Moana has been drawn to the sea, and what is inside and beyond it. Moana’s father knows that the sea and what is out there is dangerous, and forbids his daughter from ever going past the reef that encircles Motunui. However, living on an island and surrounded on all sides by the dazzling ocean, this is a heavy weight for Moana to bear.
Moana is going to be chief one day, and seeing the life of her island disintegrate, she embarks on an unthinkably perilous journey across the Pacific: to find Maui, and to make him lead her to the mother island where he can restore the heart and bring life back to the Pacific. When she finds Maui (Dwayne Johnson), he is not who Moana expects him to be, but then again, Moana is discovering herself on this voyage, too. In a sense, Moana is an odyssey — an exploration of the ocean, a discovery of friendship and one’s own true strength.
The musical numbers in the movie are as important as the ocean itself, and they range from jazzy to heart-soaring while utilizing the instruments and rhythm of island life. Music team Opetaia Foa’i, Mark Mancina and Lin-Manuel Miranda (of Hamilton fame) composed the funky and fantastic soundtrack, unique to the film’s culture but also not without Disney’s signature sweeping songs. In “How Far I’ll Go,” Frozen’s “Let It Go” has finally found a competitor.
It is hard to come by a film that audiences will keep talking about long after they leave the theater, and rarer still for this film to be an animated family movie. And yet, set smack in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, the stakes here feel as high as in any action movie. And Moana is more than strong — she is relentlessly brave.
In the movie, it’s not as much the sea choosing Moana as Moana choosing to take on the sea. Not only are legend and folklore are at play, but also courage and brazen curiosity. Moana is an important movie for young girls and for everyone in the modern era of storytelling. With its newest release, Disney is leading the trend in changing on-screen representation of different demographics. Moana is a wave audiences won’t want to miss.