Moana

If you've seen the original, you already know what this is. It's a shot-for-shot remake of the animated film. Catherine Laga'aia does a solid job as Moana, and Rena Owen absolutely steals the show as Gramma Tala. The songs are great because they were great the first time around. I think there's one new song in here, but for the most part you're getting the same music that made the original work. As for Maui, Dwayne Johnson is playing Dwayne Johnson with tattoos, and that's still the character. He's got the charisma, he's still in ridiculous shape at 50, and if you liked him the first time, you're going to like him here too. Nothing surprising about the performance, but nothing needed to be. He knows exactly what this character is. What I still don't understand is why Disney keeps making these live-action remakes. I honestly think we'd have been better off getting Moana 3 after the success of Moana 2. The animated movies already look incredible, and this doesn't improve on that. Like most of these "live-action" remakes, it's really just another animated movie with real actors standing in front of green screens. Everything else is CGI anyway, and maybe that's part of why this one isn't connecting the way Disney hoped. When I saw How to Train Your Dragon, there was something exciting about seeing those dragons brought into a live-action world. It gave you a reason for the remake to exist. Moana doesn't have that same advantage. The animated version already looked fantastic, so this version doesn't give audiences a compelling reason to revisit the story beyond seeing real actors play the parts. That said, I don't fully understand why this movie is struggling at the box office either. I know people are comparing it to Lilo & Stitch, which became a billion-dollar hit, but I think the timing hurt this movie as much as anything. You've got Toy Story 5 and Minions & Monsters fighting for the exact same family audience at the same time, plus Moana 2 came out not that long ago. Family movies don't exist in a vacuum, and this one got squeezed. I also think there are people who are just rooting for these big Disney remakes to fail before they even come out. Whether that's remake fatigue or people wanting to take shots at the big studios, I don't know. I just don't see any reason to celebrate this movie struggling, because I thought it was pretty good. One thing I really appreciated was the representation. It's nice seeing Pacific Islander actors carrying a major Disney film, and I was happy to see Disney stick with that casting rather than moving away from it. Catherine Laga'aia has a lot of screen presence, and she did exactly what the role asked of her. Again, if you liked the original, I don't see a reason not to see this one. Kids will get a kick out of it, parents already know what they're getting, and it's faithful to the movie people already love. I just wish Disney would put this energy into new animated stories instead of remaking the ones that already worked.