Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle (2018)

  This is the first Christy pick of 2019!  Yay!  Last year I had to miss several months in an effort to catch up from school but I'm hoping this counts as a fresh start.

There was a lot of discussion online about this film, seeing as Disney had already done a very expensive "live-action" (90% CGI) version a couple of years previously.  If I remember correctly, both films were in production around the same time but Disney's got out of the gate first.  There was also some noise about it being released to Netflix instead of theatrically but I think those are just the dying gasps of the old crowd.

Mowgli (Rohan Chand) was raised by wolves after being orphaned but has struggled against feeling different his whole life.  His main protectors and teachers, Bagheera (Christian Bale) the panther and Baloo (Andy Serkis) the bear, disagree with each other over the best way to keep him safe from the wrath of Shere Khan (Benedict Cumberbatch), who killed Mowgli's family.  Bagheera feels that the only way for Mowgli to survive is to be returned to the world of men but the boy soon discovers that he doesn't truly belong there either.

It's difficult to talk about this film on its own merits without comparing it to films that have come before.  Obviously, it's wildly different from the 1967 animated version and it is different enough from the 2016 Disney version that it's totally possible to have a favorite.  In its favor, it completely drops the Monkey King as a character and subplot, and adds a great deal more darkness thematically, going for an ambiguous, morally gray aspect.  Newcomer Rohan Chand does a lot to maintain sympathy for his character, and Andy Serkis has assembled a totally stellar voice cast for the animated roles.

I absolutely hated the CGI, however.  The animals never seemed realistic and every time I looked at them, I was filled with revulsion.  It's insane because Andy Serkis is like the king of motion-capture but it was like the animals' heads didn't match their bodies.  I could practically see the actors' head superimposed on the rest of the animated scene.  It was so bad that when a particular character was shown decapitated prior to being stuffed, I still expected the head to talk.  I don't know why it was decided that Kaa (Cate Blanchett) was to be some sort of prophet but it was too many shades of Galadriel for me.  The subplot with the village and the tiger hunter (Matthew Rhys) felt tacked on and underbaked.  I get why it was added, but I think it could have been handled better.

Now, none of that is to say that you shouldn't watch this if you feel like watching it.  Maybe the mo-cap won't bother you as much as it did me.