“I AM MOANA!” – Moana sings

Moana (2026) is a musical adventure film and live-action remake of the 2016 animated film of the same name that follows Moana (Catherine Lagaʻaia), a future chief on the island of Motunui, who craves the open sea and after her grandmother dies (Rena Owen), she sets out on a quest to reclaim the Heart of Te Fiti with the help of her chicken, HeHe and the demi-god, Maui (Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson) and save her island before it and the world fall into darkness.

I really don’t know how we got this remake so early. Okay, I do. It’s obvious. Dwayne (Maui) needed something to appeal to his ego that he was still a big movie star and movies can still make bank off his name and before The Smashing Machine, Moana (2016) was arguably his best performance (I haven’t seen Walking Tall or Southland Tales, forgive), so why not just do the live action version of that where he gets to play Maui again. Seems reasonable enough (in Dwayne’s mind). But the film is only a decade old at this point. The earliest live action adaptation was Lilo & Stitch. At least the argument to be had with the older Disney movies was that this is the way for some people’s kids to experience these stories in theaters for the first time, but that’s still a pretty weak argument. There is literally no reason for this film to exist other to stroke Dwayne’s ego and to make Disney a quick buck. It’s the most obvious cashgrab Disney has done in a minute (as if any of these live-action remakes aren’t obvious enough cashgrabs already) and the film clearly suffers for it.

The scene that reveals all of the film’s issues as a whole is in the famous “Shiny” scene where Maui (Johnson) must reclaim his hook from Tamatoa (Jermaine Clement), the giant crab and as soon as they enter the world of monsters. There are no monsters to be found. Maybe a giant shrimp or two. The world is only a few shades of color and they remain dominant whereever you look. Nort mixed together like a palette used to paint a pretty picture, rather colors dropped on in different sections like something out of Microsoft Paint. Lazy. Thoughtless. Then when we get to his lair, it feels like its trying to imitate the same scene, but with less energy. Laga’aia tries to imitate Auli’i Cravalho’s performance, literally trying to do an impression of how she would do it with all of the scoffs and her delivery of the sarcastic remarks. She tries to sound like her. Then you see Maui trying to encourage her forward with some jokes in which they go on for much longer than they should and they don’t land. Most importantly, his delivery is practically sleepy. There’s not much energy behind him. Then we finally get to see Tamatoa and it’s like they couldn’t decide whether to be faithful to the original film or stick to the realistic angle so met in the middle for a muddled mess of a character design. I was actually pretty excited to hear Jermaine because he’s a pretty good voice actor and the energy wasn’t there for his performance either. Then you see how this scene is paced and it tries to replicate the pace of the original scene, but none of is on beat. The rhythm is off and hits all the wrong notes. It’s off. The whole scene is off. The jokes aren’t funny and the colors? Well, they try. You understand what I mean when I say that encompasses the film’s problems as a whole.

The energy of the film feels drained. The rhythm from scene to scene is off. It plays it too faithful to the original film and misunderstands what made the original animated film so beloved. The jokes go on way too long or aren’t delivered in a new way to make it funny, so pieces of dialogue hit like a deflated whoopie cushion rather than with a bang. The editing is off; again, trying to replicate the animated film, but comes off as jarring the way characters would jump from scene to scene in the way it would lack continuity. With an animated film, I don’t think that matters as much as your mind fills in the gaps. It’s a subliminal thing. I don’t believe that rules works as well in live-action. Because of this, I have no connection to any of the emotional moments, so they don’t hit. It’s just frustrating.

I mean, at least it’s not gray, but the colors feel flat, especially compared to the animated film. I think both Catherine Lagaʻaia (Moana) and Dwayne Johnson (Maui) are fine, but again, their performances feel flat. And it doesn’t feel cheap. Thankfully as it has the whole Disney machine behind it. But now, I have a whole question: who is seeing these anymore?

I don’t mind the reasoning of families seeing these movies because there’s not a lot of films for families in theaters right now. If you want to take your kids to see a movie because there’s nothing else. Fine. Do it. But if you are going to see this because you loved the original: why? No. I want your answer. Why? Why are you going to see this? Why is the original not enough? Why do you have to feel justified in avoiding your shame that you are seeing something made for children just because it is live action? Is animation, as a medium, not good enough for you? Do you not see it as a medium? Do you see it as something you put on for kids to distract them rather than actually engaging with it because it might challenge you? If you truly believe animation can’t be for adults unless it’s raunchy like Family Guy or edgy like Rick & Morty, then why won’t you watch something like Anomalisa or Flee? Those are meant for adults and ask hard questions. Why? It boggles my mind because you do not care for animation at all. You legitimately think less of the medium and that’s a real shame because you’re missing out.

I really hope this film flops. Don’t see this film in theaters. Wait until it comes to Disney+. Stop giving these films your money. Disney needs to do better. Families deserve better. Animation should be respected more. In theaters now.

RATING: 1.5/5