When I reviewed the list of movies available to watch on my flight, there really weren’t a lot of films that I really had to watch (even Deadpool was not a must-watch). However, I noticed that my neighbor was watching Zootopia even though I didn’t see it in my list previously. I wanted to watch Zootopia when I heard that it was the top grossing animated movie this year, but then after seeing this funny trailer, I was really interested.

The premise of Zootopia is similar to The Good Dinosaur where humans did not become the dominant species. In Zootopia, all mammals evolved and became human-like. One of the most fun things about this film is seeing how animals do human things (like getting drinks or listening to mp3s). The second fun thing is to see how different species of animals interact with each other.

The animation was great, although I’m not sure if it was because my screen was small. Even if it was due to resizing effects, I think the life-likeness of the animals was very impressive, specifically the facial expressions. It was noticeable and easy to tell child animal mannerisms from grown adult ones. Although, it’s also possible that this has to do with being unfamiliar of how animals facial features might express human emotions.

After the story started in earnest, I began to lose track of these cool elements (which is a shame, maybe worth watching a second time just to watch the background). The story isn’t terrible, but it doesn’t compare to the concept, environment and animation. The plot is a bit mature so I don’t think it’ll be enjoyable for little kids even though its theme (diversity and inclusion) is worthwhile for children to understand! Overall the execution was great, but the plot (being a non-adult movie) drags it down slightly to be a 4 out of 5 stars in my book.

Posted by Kevin in Blogs Tags: cartoons, moviereview