Moana

I have seen Moana 10 times. That means I have watched this film once a month since it was first released in the UK last December. I regret nothing. With that said, I have finally compiled my thoughts and feelings into one small-ish post. 

Moana can't have been an easy film to make. Three years on and it has become all the more clear the kind of impact that Frozen really had - despite being hideously awful... sorry not sorry. Anything attempting to get away with a "one true love's kiss" is going to seem trite and old-fashioned after Frozen went about deconstructing many of the tropes most closely associated with these kind of films, and that puts Moana in a very difficult position. How does a princess movie follow the film that killed the princess movie?

Moana's answer to that question is a simple but effective one - move with the times. The cliches so expertly refuted by Frozen are instead ignored entirely by Moana, making it feel like just as much of an evolution of the princess movie as Frozen does, albeit in a quieter, less obvious way. Our main character is a princess in status only, and there isn't a romantic subplot or a damsel in distress to be found within throwing distance of the film - in fact, she may well be the single most capable female heroine Disney have ever created, a natural leader right from the start of the movie played perfectly by young Auli'i Cravalho.

In a lot of ways Moana feels like a return to form for Walt Disney Animation Studios, really managing to recapture the magic of the Disney Renaissance era for the first time. By my reckoning, this is their first film to really explore another culture since Mulan, and Moana makes the most of it. The legends and myths used by Moana feel authentic, and the plot - which sees Moana sailing across the sea in order to deliver demigod Māui to the goddess Te Fiti - is made all the more engaging, all the richer for it. It feels as if there is an expansive history informing everything that happens in the film, helping flesh out this world beyond what we see of it.

Not that what we do see of it is underwhelming - Moana is gorgeous, probably one of the best looking films of 2016 if not 2017 too. There are subtleties to the facial expressions and movements of the characters that make them feel more real than ever, and the vivid colours and inventive visuals on display set the film apart from predecessors, especially when combined with the themes that Moana is playing with and the spiritual nature of the story being told. Whether it be in the wonderful mix of animation styles that accompanies the song You're Welcome or the spectacularly imposing figure of antagonist Te Kā, Moana is a treat for the eyes throughout.

Realistically, Moana almost certainly won't be as popular as Frozen - I simply can't see it registering with that film's primary audience in the same way - but there is no doubt in my mind that it deserves to be. In successfully providing all the heart, energy and charm that you'd expect from a traditional Disney film without bringing nearly 80 years of baggage along for the ride, directors John Musker and Ron Clements have created one of the most purely enjoyable movies of the year, one that really feels like something special even while you're watching it - and one that deserves to be seen several times by as many people as possible.

Dunkirk

Christopher Nolan is often accused of being an emotionless director, and while it's a criticism I've only ever half agreed with in the past, Dunkirk certainly doesn't provide much of a counter-argument. It's a movie he's been wanting to make for the last 25 years, one he deliberately put on the back-burner until he felt that he had enough experience directing blockbusters to do it justice.

Dunkirk is finely tuned and impeccably crafted, but there's simply not much more to it than that. By weaving through three overlapping time-frames that each follow a different part of the evacuation - land, sea and air - Nolan is able to ensure that the pace never dips for even a moment while also giving Dunkirk the ability to explore three very different types of action, and it is this variation that allows the film to remain spectacular throughout. It is, in effect, a roller-coaster, and as such its entertainment value comes far more from the up and downs along the way than than it does actually reaching its destination.

And from that perspective Dunkirk is difficult to fault, keeping its audience on the edge of their seats from its opening scene to its final minutes thanks to Nolan's sheer ability behind the camera. Interestingly for a war film, we only ever catch a mere glimpse of the enemy soldiers, a decision that only heightens the tension - danger could come from any direction at any time, keeping the characters we follow on the back foot throughout as they merely try to survive impossible odds rather than achieve any grand victory. Between excellent staging, a preference for practical effects and some truly brilliant sound design, Nolan ensures that we're right alongside these soldiers as they find themselves trapped on sinking ships or unable to hide from the enemy places screaming overhead, and the result is deeply engaging, at least in the moment. But to what end? All this craft is ultimately in service of a film that feels surprisingly shallow and almost entirely uninterested in the events themselves, to the point where one has to wonder why Nolan even wanted to make Dunkirk. For all the effort that went into making it as historically accurate as possible, Dunkirk could be set on another planet without altering the thrust of the story or its function thanks to Nolan's unwillingness to really have a viewpoint or opinion.

It's this distancing effect that robs Dunkirk of much of the long-term impact it could have had, and while it might not be as big a deal in other circumstances, Dunkirk's lack of characters worth caring about only makes the aforementioned lack of perspective and purpose all the more noticeable. With the sole exception of Mark Rylance's Mr Dawson, the people we follow throughout Dunkirk are less definable characters and more avatars for us to experience the evacuation through - I'd have a hard time assigning any of them with a personality trait or characteristic, never mind remembering their names. And it's not that the performances are lacking - everyone from lead actor Fionn Whitehead to Tom Hardy to Harry Styles are giving it their all - it's simply that there is very little on the page for them to work with.

Ultimately, Dunkirk shows us a Christopher Nolan who rather than testing himself as a director and story-teller has chosen to play to his strengths and all but entirely ignore his weaknesses, and while it still ends up being quite the feat of film-making from a technical perspective, it also means that it never risks being a genuinely great movie.