The Sea Beast movie review: Netflix’s new animated film is the cartoon critique of colonialism that RRR wishes it was
Amid the season glut of theatrical animated movies dominated by sequels and prequels (and a minimum of one sequel to a prequel) arrives The Sea Beast, a brand new Netflix journey that capabilities not solely as a welcome reminder of what the streamer is able to, however may additionally function some much-needed respite for fogeys dulled by the tunes of “We Don’t Speak About Bruno.”
A extra vibrant takedown of colonialism than RRR may ever be and a metaphorical critique of all the pieces that Gru and his form stand for, The Sea Beast is the uncommon kids’s movie with grand concepts on its thoughts. It favours kaiju battles over contrived pop-culture references, nevertheless it additionally talks about generational ache and the cycles of violence that always trigger it.
Karl City voices Jacob Holland, a swashbuckling hero who’s outcast by his pirate crew after befriending an orphan lady named Maisie, voiced by newcomer Zaris-Angel Hator. Like so many children her age, Maisie had grown up idolising ‘hunters’ like Jacob, whose predominant job is to maintain communities of people secure from sea beasts with a historical past of attacking them. Or so everyone has been informed.
We see the ‘hunters’ in motion within the movie’s spectacular opening scene, which pits them in opposition to a very gnarly-looking monster and provides Jacob loads of alternative to indicate off. He slicks throughout the deck with about as a lot ease as City swinging out and in of his native New Zealand accent and the cockney cadence of Billy the Butcher from The Boys.
Like Peter Quill from the Guardians of the Galaxy motion pictures, Jacob was taken in by the pirates as a misplaced little one. And like these movies, The Sea Beast additionally flirts with themes of discovered household, first after Jacob is accepted by the pirates as one in every of their very own, after which years later, when he embraces his paternal facet on his adventures with Maisie. Her mother and father, we’re informed, had been ‘hunters’ similar to him.
However when Maisie begins to query all the pieces she’s been taught through the years — not solely about her mother and father but additionally the ‘monsters’ that supposedly killed them — it provides the movie an opportunity to swim away from its comparatively light-hearted tone and in direction of what it truly is, an anti-imperialism cartoon that’s progressive with out ever being woke. Which is outstanding, contemplating simply how passionately it rages in opposition to the rigours of custom.
“They had been heroes,” Jacob reminds Maisie about her people in a single key scene halfway by means of the movie. And the very clever Maisie, having freshly seemed a sea beast within the eye and cast a reference to it, responds gravely, “Possibly you could be a hero, and nonetheless be mistaken.”
Maisie is, in some ways, the parallel protagonist of the movie, which smarty avoids falling into the Dangal lure and permits the younger lady to be the grasp of her personal future, the captain of her personal destiny. She’s lots just like the titular heroine of director Chris Williams’ earlier movie, Moana, who shared the same dynamic with Maui.
However whereas The Sea Beast may need thematic overlaps with movies equivalent to Moana and The best way to Practice Your Dragon, the animation right here isn’t of the identical degree because the crème de la crème of Disney and DreamWorks. The motion, nonetheless, is staged with creativeness, and regardless of the movie lacks intimately, it greater than makes up for with its ingenious creature designs. Significantly memorable is a mid-movie sequence through which a stranded Maisie and Jacob escape from a horde of balloon-looking child monsters on a pink seaside. It’s vibrant, fast-paced, and interesting on a number of ranges. However between you and I, it’s most likely a blessing in disguise that this movie received’t be seen on the massive display screen; that may have uncovered a few of its visible shortcomings.
It’s the form of film you curl up with at residence. The Sea Beast doesn’t have the scientific cynicism of Encanto or Frozen, and it most undoubtedly isn’t as garish because the Despicable Me motion pictures, however for audiences conditioned to cough up their hard-earned money on the slightest glimpse of the Magic Kingdom (or the sounds of little yellow folks saying the phrase ‘banana’ again and again), it’d really be the swift kick up the bottom that they so desperately want.
The Sea Beast
Director – Chris Williams
Forged – Karl City, Zaris-Angel Hator, Jared Harris
Ranking – 4/5
