Hey folks, Harry here... Ya know... dammit... please let BROTHER BEAR work... I want Traditional Animation to succeed domestically... Or, maybe it does need to die for a bit, only to be retransformed anew later. Sounds like BROTHER BEAR is straddling the line between GOOD MOVIE and BAD MOVIE... This review leans more towards good than bad... Beware of Spoilers...
Hey Harry, Blabbermouse squeakin’ at ya, back from taking a sneak peek at Disney’s “Brother (not Br’er) Bear.”
Can’t say I was overly excited about this one beforehand – that adorably feisty (‘I’m a raging ball of fur’) bear cub in the trailers seemed a mite too adorable for my taste; then the advertising started ignoring the film’s premise in favor of the comedy relief, as if the studio wasn’t sure what they were selling or how to sell it. With all the rumors flying around about Disney supposedly turning its back on classic 2D animation, a lot more than the success or failure of a single movie may be at stake here. After a brief run of scifi-themed pictures (commercially speaking, the successful Lilo & Stitch, the lukewarm Atlantis & the disastrous Treasure Planet) Disney is returning to the heartwarming characters + music formula – with a vengeance. They’ve been spending a whole lot of marketing bucks to make this picture a hit, with billboards & bus ads all over town along with a huge, fold-out poster tucked into every copy of last week’s newspaper.
On the other hand, I’ve always been a fan of transformation-themed movies, and Disney’s been no slouch at providing them, from Pinocchio through The Shaggy Dog, The Sword in the Stone, right up to the kick-ass funny Emperor’s New Groove. (Miyazaki’s Spirited Away also qualifies since Disney distributed it.) The sub-theme of these movies is often ‘human gets turned into an animal and learns to be a better person,’ which is definitely the case here.
In case you haven’t heard, “Brother Bear” is about Kenai, a hotheaded young Indian who, in order to learn a Valuable Life Lesson, gets turned into a bear – ‘magically,’ as he explains with one of the most unnecessary adverbs ever used in a movie. (I mean, magically as opposed to genetic experimentation? Plastic surgery? A Minoxidil overdose?) I won’t delve into the plot except to reveal that the V.L.L. is (SPOILER!) vengeance can lead to unforeseen destructive consequences while love is a positive, healing force in the universe.
The movie goes through more than a few transformations of its own, beginning with an attitude of deep reverence for Native American culture and spiritual beliefs, followed by Indians who say ‘knock it off’ or call each other ‘loverboy.’ Keep an eye on the sides of the screen: the aspect ratio changes from standard to Cinemascope depending on whether the current scene focuses on humans or animals.
The animals change too, or at least how they’re represented. Early on in the film Kenai battles a ferocious, and completely realistically-drawn bear. (A great sequence, by the way.) The anthropomorphism kicks in with a vengeance however, once Kenai (did I mention Joaquin Phoenix does his voice?) turns into a bear himself – a big-eyed, expressive-faced, Disney-style anthropomorphic one. Now on the other side of the human/animal divide, Kenai can understand and speak the lingua franca of the forest, which also features a good deal of early 21st century American slang.
It’s here he meets up with that ever so cuddly cub, the irrepressible Koda. Kenai’s initial irritation at precocious Koda matched my own, but somehow a traveling-through-the-forest montage set to a Phil Collins song is all it takes to turn them into good buddies. (Phil’s songs – at least when he performs them – all sound like they were written specifically to snag a nomination at next year’s Oscars; personally, I much preferred Tina Turner’s belt-it-out ‘Great Spirits’ number.)
Rick Moranis’ and Dave Thomas’ McKenzie brothers are indeed all over the movie, themselves transformed into sibling moose(s). They meet Kenai shortly after his initial transformation, but keep turning up in later sequences that feel suspiciously like focus group-inspired add-ons. (The endless roll of ‘Additional’ scripters, artists, etc. in the closing credits just adds to this suspicion.) Their interplay is genuinely funny, but could’ve come straight out of a 1980’s SCTV show, only with Bob and Doug in moose suits. (Wow, that would’ve made a good episode, come to think of it…)
Koda leads Kenai to a fishing spot favored by all the local bears, where Kenai starts getting in touch with his inner ursine. I half-expected Baloo or Humphrey to do a cameo in the background (the way Scar shows up as a lionskin in Hercules), but the film instead introduces an enormous, grayish bear named Tug (voiced by the almost-as-large Michael Clarke Duncan) who I SWEAR is the Country Bears’ Big Al gone native. (Here’s a typical gag from the film: when two bears are getting a little too lovey-dovey in front of everyone, an onlooker hollers “get a cave!”)
Before I went, I told a friend the only way the film would surprise me is if [SPOILER DELETED] at the very end. Well, wouldn’t you know it, but [SPOILER DELETED] is exactly what happened. Now does that mean they surprised me, or the fact that I even entertained the possibility that [SPOILER DELETED] might happen means they didn’t surprise me? Either way, I’m glad they did it. (Here’s a teeny-tiny spoiler for real: I haven’t seen this many spirits show up at the end of a movie since Return of the Jedi.)
Rather than Pixar-style outtakes, a handful of cartoony blackout gags accompany the closing credits, including one (if you feel like hanging around) at the very end. They’re all funny, but they (intentionally?) add to the film’s unpredictable-transformation feeling: after spending 90 minutes accepting the animals as updated Bambi-style anthropomorphized creatures, they suddenly reveal themselves as camera and audience-aware performers.
Technically and visually, the film is not to be knocked: lots of impressive camera moves, multiplane and in-depth effects that complement rather than overwhelm the hand-drawn animation. The color schemes are downright beautiful, with subtle shifts that evoke the time of day or emotion of the moment. And for all his cuteness, Koda is nowhere as annoying as Rosie O’Donnell’s ape in Tarzan, or ‘I’m gonna be the bestest ape ever’ Li’l Tarzan.
Even though I enjoyed the film, the shifts in tone between drama/action and comedy didn’t feel as organic, as natural as they could’ve been and made it hard for me to wrap my paws around it. Unfortunately, after the last few films that – for better or worse – explored some new territory (and I loved Treasure Planet, the biggest failure of the bunch, along with New Groove, which went for straight-out comedy), ‘Brother Bear’ comes across as a play-it-safe effort. If it makes Disney a few bucks, look for them to stick with their magic formula again for a while. It wouldn’t be the end of the world, especially if the upside is that reports of the death of 2D animation will once again prove greatly exaggerated.
Blabbermouse
