- #HOW LONG IS RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON MOVIE MOVIE#
- #HOW LONG IS RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON MOVIE SERIES#
The standouts are the mouth-watering shots of different foods, from tom yum-inspired stew to shrimp congee.
From the photorealistic water effects and breathtaking landscapes to the intricate outfits and captivating colour palette, every frame is a feast for the eyes. Ultimately, it feels like inconsequential set dressing: very pretty, but not to be confused for representation or diversity.Īnd speaking of prettiness – Raya’s saving grace is its undeniably gorgeous animation. But there’s nothing connecting the supposed Southeast Asian influences to the events of the movie, which can be attributed to the fact that the film is set in a made-up fantasy world (unlike Coco or Moana).
There are cultural touchstones here and there, like when Raya’s tribe welcomes other clans by playing the gamelan, or when our heroine wields a keris and Arnis sticks instead of a sword. But that’s the thing: the references only scratch the surface. On the other hand, Sisu is a nice nod to general East Asian mythology, where dragons are creatures of water and not fire. What Raya truly needed was a relief from comedy. But without a strong enough story nor a comedic actor that can pull off this very specific brand of improv, Sisu comes off as a joke machine that’s there to banter with the protagonist when there’s a lull. In trying to emulate the success of the Disney Renaissance, Raya also carries over the tonal inconsistencies of those films. While the actress has proven that she can be a gifted comic actor (and a good dramatic one as well, as The Farewell showed), but when it comes to improv, she’s no Eddie Murphy, no James Wood and certainly no Robin Williams. It’s obvious the filmmakers had hoped for Sisu to enter the Disney sidekick hall of fame alongside greats like Mushu, Hades and Genie – but the character falls woefully short. The worst offender is Awkwafina’s corny and awkward character, the water dragon Sisu. The film uses comedy as a way to familiarise the audience with the increasingly farcical number of supporting characters, but due to the sheer number of them, Raya comes across more like an extended joke with plot points sprinkled between. Raya And The Last Dragon wants to be a serious story about how terrible and selfish humans can be when we don’t trust one another, but that gets lost buried under the disproportionate levels of comic relief. There’s also a problem with the movie’s tone. The clumsy, constant resets that Raya’s story is forced to undergo kill any momentum that has been built and undermine the film’s climax. The film feels like a mini-series that you binge once and forget about (and its premiere on Disney+ won’t help matters).
#HOW LONG IS RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON MOVIE SERIES#
Rinse and repeat.Īt worst, the structure feels akin to cherry-picking and mashing together key episodes from a long-running television series – which Raya could have been, given the sheer amount of worldbuilding that has gone into it. The film falls into a rhythm: viewers are introduced to a new clan, Raya faces a small obstacle but gains a new ally, Sisu messes up somehow, the group face a big obstacle, but eventually get the gem shard and scarper for the next land.
When Raya finally gets into the meat of the plot, it feels stifled due to the almost episodic story structure. But at the end of the day, it’s still just exposition – exposition that directors Don Hall and Carlos López Estrada spend a notable amount of the movie’s runtime on. All that is explored in detail during the film’s very lengthy prologue, which is told beautifully with animation that draws from wayang kulit puppet theatre. There’s also something about Sisu’s dragon siblings, another thing about soul-stealing purple monsters called the Drunn, and, oh, about 500 years of history between the various clans. Along the way, she unwittingly gathers a ragtag team of supporting characters, including goofy water dragon Sisu (Awkwafina), all the while hunted by a nemesis princess named Namaari (Gemma Chan). She’s on a quest to collect shards of a magical dragon gem from the five feuding clans in order to restore Kumandra to its former glory. Raya (voiced by Kelly Marie Tran, who rose to fame as Rose Tico in Star Wars: The Last Jedi) is a warrior princess who sets off across the post-apocalyptic fantasy world of Kumandra, which is allegedly inspired by Southeast Asian culture. But all that – mostly – goes out the window with Raya And The Last Dragon, the entertainment conglomerate’s first new original (read: non-sequel) animated film since 2016’s Moana.
#HOW LONG IS RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON MOVIE MOVIE#
Disney’s fail-proof formula for a princess movie is well known: there’s the song that serves as a grand statement of intent or desire, the undeniably evil villain, the talking animal sidekick and the love interest.
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