The new animated comedy and kiddie flick Kung Fu Panda probably seems better than it is on the simple basis of relativity. In other words, there’s enough mere adequacy, middling mediocrity and outright awfulness out there right now that it’s not hard to look good—but don’t sell the Panda short. In any season, this would be a terrific-looking picture. As computer animation goes, this just might be the most striking-looking film yet. Some of the imagery is little short of sublime, sometimes in big, flashy ways, and other times in surprisingly subtle ways. There are moments of spectacle right alongside moments of great delicacy. But its merits don’t end there.
The near genius of the film—big-name stars doing voices to one side—is that it almost completely eschews the snarky postmodern, pop-culture-referencing sensibility that seemed pretty fresh and cheeky when Shrek (2001) first appeared on the scene, but now looks more tired and desperate than a dateless working girl at last call in a dive bar. Seven years of Shrek knockoffs (including last year’s Shrek the Third) have taken a toll. How refreshing it is to encounter a film of this sort where the viewer doesn’t have to know who Shirley Bassey is to get the jokes. (And that comment is coming from a guy who loved the Shirley Bassey joke in Shrek 2 (2004).) The humor here is fairly simple and lightweight, but it grows out of the characters and the situation, with none of that aura of “see how clever and hip we are” weighing it down.
There is a pop-culture side to it all, but it’s an entire genre: the martial-arts movie in all its color-saturated, often glorious absurdity. There’s very little here that conjures up specific scenes—though there are clear echoes of Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)—but rather an overall sense of the tropes of the genre. I’d add that the conventions are taken to their illogical extreme, but after Kung Fu Hustle (2004) and The Protector (2005), the only illogical extreme left is the bulk and shape of this film’s hero.
The story line is nothing special (what example of chop-socky cinema is?). Po (voiced by Jack Black) is a fat, rather lazy panda who works in his dad’s (voiced by James Hong, Balls of Fury) noodle shop, but dreams of being the kung-fu master of all time, the Dragon Warrior. (Dad, by the way, is either a crane or stork, which the film appears to be about to explain at one point and then doesn’t.) An accident causes Po to land in just the right place for the ancient temple master—a wizened turtle named Oogway (voiced by Randall Duk Kim, Year of the Fish)—to choose Po as, you guessed it, the prophesied Dragon Warrior. Not surprisingly given their name, this sits badly with the “Furious Five” (voiced by Angelina Jolie, Jackie Chan, Seth Rogen, Lucy Liu, David Cross) and their master Shifu (Dustin Hoffman), a very serious and sarcastic red panda. But they accede to the temple master—while being determined to drive Po off.
Nothing that follows is apt to surprise anyone other than very young children. The plot is given some urgency when the villainous leopard Tai Lung (voiced by Ian McShane) escapes from his maximum-security prison. Tai goes after the scroll that rightfully belongs to the Dragon Warrior and will afford him great power. The plot is slim and simple, but it works. For that matter, its final message could be viewed as a subversive variant on the standard “believe in yourself” kid-flick message.
There are some shortcomings. Of the pricier names in the voice cast, only Jack Black and Dustin Hoffman really get anything of note to do, which is fine for the story—especially since the pair have terrific chemistry—but might disappoint fans of the others. Supporting performers like Randall Duk Kim and James Hong are, in fact, better served. The script has a weird out-of-left-field moment (involving Oogway) about a third of the way through that goes for an emotional punch the film hasn’t earned and doesn’t achieve. And personally, I’d have liked a little more closure involving the climactic battle. But all of this is almost needless carping with a film this engaging and visually stunning. Rated PG for sequences of martial-arts action.
I may have to see KUNG-FU PANDA on your recommendation, Mr. Hanke. I admit disillusionment with the current abundance of self-referential Fourth Wall postmodern C.G.I. comedies. Make no mistake: I actually adore the whole self-referential Fourth Wall postmodern comedy sub-sub-subgenre. Unfortunately, most SHREK imitators miss the two fundamental elements of that subgenre.
First, in order for self-reference to seem insightful rather than merely smug, it has to parody genre tropes. That’s the entire purpose of postmodernism: art examining itself from an exterior perspective. Admittedly, the most detailed genre parodies (THE LAST ACTION HERO, GALAXY QUEST, THE ABRIDGED MOVIE) have limited appeal, but at least they manage that appeal intelligently.
Second, pop-cultural references are only funny when they arise from the plot. You can’t just shoehorn in irrelevant one-liners. Remember the SPIDER-MAN gag in THE ABRIDGED MOVIE? “You took two thirds of this movie just to get out in the open. Who the H*ll do you think you are — Venom?” It’s funny because it’s true to the circumstances of the storyline.
Modern filmmakers are eager to imitate classic Fourth Wall comedies (MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL, GET SMART, THE LAST ACTION HERO, GALAXY QUEST, SHREK, HOT FUZZ, THE ABRIDGED MOVIE), but they haven’t studied in detail the reasons why those films work so well.
Of course, self-referential/fourth wall stuff is nothing new in itself. Groucho Marx did it in the 20s, 30s and 40s. Oliver Hardy was forever looking at the camera in a mute appeal for sympathy at what had just befallen him or what was about to befall him. There’s a surprising — and possibly unique — bit of breaking the fourth wall in Ernst Lubitsch’s One Hour with You (1932). While Maurice Chevalier had talked to the audience at several points in the film, in the very last scene both he and Jeanette MacDonald do so.
Perhaps the most immediately obvious self-referential material comes from the Bing, Bob and Dotty “Road” pictures. By the second film in the series, Road to Zanzibar (1941), it’s started with a scene where the boys go into the “patty cake” routine establishedin Road to Singapore (1940) only to have it backfire on them, whereupon Bob remarks, “He musta seen the picture!” It happens again in Road to Morocco (1942), but this time Bing remarks, “Yes, sir, Junior, that thing sure got around.” Of course, by then there are references to their contract with Paramount Pictures and how they’ll probably run into Dorothy Lamour — not to mention a scene where Bob recounts the story of the film, explaining that the people who came in in the middle of the picture don’t know this stuff. An annoyed Bing cries out, “You mean they missed my song?” All these things work not because they’re random, but because they’re actually functional and they’re funny. That they assume you’ve seen the previous movies is perhaps a weakness, but it’s a calculated risk that assumes you probably saw those movies if you’re watching this one. (That worked better at the time than it might now when you’re apt to see the films out of order.)
One of the great strengths of Blazing Saddles lies in the fact that it lampoons the whole western genre and doesn’t rely on specific familiarities. One of the weaknesses of Young Frankenstein lies in many of the gags only being terribly funny if you know the specifics of the scenes (from movies that were then 30 to 40 years old) being parodied.
There’s nothing wrong with any of this used properly and not being overused.
Gotta admit I have no idea what The Abridged Movie is.
Of course, self-referential/fourth wall stuff is nothing new in itself.
The first line that comes to my mind is always: “Get out of here — you’re going to make the whole thing unbelievable!”
One of the weaknesses of Young Frankenstein lies in many of the gags only being terribly funny if you know the specifics of the scenes (from movies that were then 30 to 40 years old) being parodied.
Galaxy Quest suffered the same deficiency, but I adored it simply because I was a Trekker in my youth. (It’s one of the only Tim Allen films that actually works, because its entire premise is that Tim Allen is an awful actor a la William Shatner.) Its inherent paradox is that it would never have appealed to its target audience at all unless it was completely incomprehensible to everyone else.
There’s nothing wrong with any of this used properly and not being overused.
It’s the overuse that’s getting on my nerves. As I said, I love that subgenre — but it doesn’t need to be the be-all end-all of comedy. Every filmmaker between here and Timbuktu jumped on the postmodern bandwagon after Shrek. Fantasy epics annoy me for the same reason: I love archetypical quest fantasy, but there are many other forms of fantasy (steampunk, alternate history, urban, generational) which have fallen by the wayside to make room for an endless parade of Tolkien imitators.
Gotta admit I have no idea what The Abridged Movie is.
It was a British parody of commercialistic Japanese cartoons (a fad which my own generation thankfully missed). The whole production was dubiously legal because it was a re-dub of the Japanese trading-card tie-in Yu-Gi-Oh: The Movie: The Pyramid of Light. It was good only insofar as an amateur production can be good — viz., you laugh, but only because you have lowered standards for anything you find online. Some of the lines are surprisingly droll and articulate, sandwiched as they are amidst a sequence of predictable sex jokes. It’s one of those films you find yourself compulsively quoting for weeks regardless of how good it actually was, and for that reason alone, it’s achieved minor cult status. I believe it’s now available free online, so if you’re one of those individuals who found the Pokemon craze completely incomprehensible, you might want to check it out for an idle giggle.
The first line that comes to my mind is always: “Get out of here—you’re going to make the whole thing unbelievable!”
Yes, and that’s after the same buzzards had turned into penguins “singing” “In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening,” too!
Every filmmaker between here and Timbuktu jumped on the postmodern bandwagon after Shrek. Fantasy epics annoy me for the same reason: I love archetypical quest fantasy, but there are many other forms of fantasy (steampunk, alternate history, urban, generational) which have fallen by the wayside to make room for an endless parade of Tolkien imitators.
I’d probably call them “Peter Jacksons without the same budget,” but I tend to agree. The problem, of course, is the Hollywood mindest that imitation may not be the sincerest form of flattery, but it’s the quickest route to a fast buck.
While I did find the whole Pokemon thing pretty incomprehensible (okay, so Pikachu is cute) and Yu-Gi-Oh even more so, I think I’ll pass on the parody. Having reviewed two Pokemon movies (one of which I find is mysteriously credited to “anonymous”) before passing Yu-Gi-Oh to Marci Miller (who, in part, wrote, “I spent most of its excruciating 89 minutes fantasizing over how to torture Ken Hanke for making me review it”), I think I’ve been pokemoned enough for one life time.
I just reread my comments here and would like to clarify, lest I sound insufferably lowbrow in the presence of the great Ken Hanke, that when I referred to “classic” self-referential movies, I meant widely-liked self-referential movies. I don’t actually regard Shrek as great cinema, but it has defined the popular perception of self-referentiality for several years. The definition of a classic is, after all, entirely subjective and difficult to determine without decades of retrospection.
Also, I meant Get Smart the television show, not Get Smart the recent movie.
With my butt now covered, I retire in (slightly alleviated) disgrace.