March 6, 2021
The evil Druun spirits overrun the land of Kumundra and turned all the people and dragons into stone. The last dragon Sisu used a magical blue gem to drive the Druun away and bring people back to life. However, since then Kumundra had been divided into five different factions: Fang, Talon, Heart, Spine and Tail. The guardian of the gem is the Heart tribe, which caused the other tribes to be jealous of its status.
500 years later, Princess Raya, daughter of the Chief Benja of Heart, was deceived into revealing the secret location of the blue gem. As a result, the gem broken up into five fragments, with one piece winding up with each tribe. This leads to the return of the Druun and the disaster it brought. For the next six years, Raya had been in search of the long lost Sisu with the hope of bringing her back to set things right again.
The computer animation of Disney continues to progress here, coming up with stunning images, especially when it comes to depicting humans (faces, expressions, hair and fight movements), the cute animal sidekicks (particularly Tuk-tuk the rolling armadillo) and nature scenes. The animation of water and its various forms was a key aspect of this story because Sisu was a water dragon (with four feet and fur). The territory of each faction had its own distinct topography and culture, each approximating a different Southeast Asian country of inspiration. Aside from arnis and the kris sword, there was hardly anything distinctly Filipino in there, not even the much-publicized first Filipino Disney theme song.
The voice work of the mainly Asian-American cast certainly added to the entertaining quality of this film. The most distinct work here was by Awkwafina who gave Sisu a warm and generous personality. Sisu's human form had her face, which was delightful. Kelly Marie Tran (best known as Rose Tico in "The Last Jedi") imbued Raya with bravery and singularity of purpose, while Gemma Chan (best know as Astrid in "Crazy Rich Asians") matched her grit as her nemesis Namaari. Daniel Dae Kim (as Raya's dad), Sandra Oh (as Namaari's mom) and Benjamin Wong (as the gentle giant Tong) were the other familiar names in the cast.
The plot followed the typical Disney formula a little too closely so that the story became quite predictable. Naive lead character commits a major blunder that leads to a major problem which she then needs to solve. Raya's father shared the same fate as other Disney parents. There was a quest to locate and collect items in order to put them back together again. The lead character met new friends (a boy boatsman from Tail, a cute baby con artist from Talon, a one-eyed warrior from Spine) along the way to help with her mission.
The lesson of this new Disney film was a very idealistic one for the world today. It pushes for trust in one's fellow man, not exactly an easy thing to do these days. However, the way they do it made this aim difficult to achieve. The film depicted the disastrous result of innocent trust of a child, something that causes the loss of her loved one and the ruin of her entire tribe. This created an uneasy sense of distrust in Raya, and likely, also in its young audience. How could you put utmost trust in someone who had betrayed you big time? Parental guidance is definitely required for this, but even for parents, this is a very tough call. 7/10.
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