Voyage vers la Lune

A Netflix animated movie that very much follows the Disney/Pixar conventions. It's done well and with sensitivity, but it's let down by a mediocre middle section.

Loosely based on a Chinese legend, it tells the story of a girl whose mother dies and has to face the possibility of his father marrying again. She is not ready to let go and accept someone else in her family, so she ends up travelling to the moon with the unwelcome company of her annoying little step-brother to find proof that the fairy tales her mother told her were real, and hopefully convince her dad to remember her mother and not marry again.

The 3D animation looks quite good in the scenes set in China, with very expressive characters suiting the sentimental story being told. Once on the Moon, however, the acid-trip colors used there can't hide that the animation becomes more simplistic and cheap.

It's also in that middle part where the sensitive storytelling turns into a collection of so-so animation for children tropes. The improvement of the relationship between the main character and her step-brother is explored very superficially.

The songs (for this is a musical) are nice, and the resolution is satisfactory. Sure, the message here is very conventional, but then this is a movie for children, and it is with enough charm that I found it touching. It is a pity that they couldn't come up with something more special for the middle section.

Started of very well, nice and gripping story. And then comes the moon with neon colors and a stupid pop star God. Is this what we really want to show the children? There are better ways to tell a story about loss and progress with life.

This is a film in two parts: the beginning and end are a very nicely animated story of grief and the struggle to belong while the middle is a strange neon Fantasia adventure that isn't wholly appealing. The animation stops just short of being interesting or inventive, but the music is flat out boring (I cannot recall a single bit of it less than an hour from finishing the movie). Much is familiar with Disney's influence everywhere. The hare looks exactly like a green Mad Hatter and you'll spy Cinderella's castle at least once. Some things aren't as well defined and look almost unfinished. There are absolutely moments of excellence (there's a particularly great moment at the end), but overall I was bored. This film had great promise and I love the representation. Unfortunately, it wasn't for me.

As a Chinese person, I LOVED seeing so much wonderful cultural representation and the all-Asian cast. As a kid, there was very little of this type of thing available to me and I'm happy that my four year old enjoys this movie and sees positive representations of this part of her heritage.

I thought the visuals were stunning, and the animation and character design were lovely.

Otherwise, it was... fine. I feel like the movie started off strong. I got teary during the first part. Then the story just got kind of confusing and I felt very little emotional connection to the characters. The singing is good, but I didn't find the music as catchy or memorable as some other recent musicals. I'll watch this again with my kid and I prefer it to something like Frozen, Cars, or The Good Dinosaur, but I don't think it's as good as my favorite Pixar films like Wall-e or Monsters, Inc.

Top notch animation. but if you've seen as many animated films as i've done then the plot won't stand out in any way.