Film & TV Review: Turning Red is a Triumph Example of Pixar’s Transformation
Disney-Pixar’s Turning Red tells the story about 13 years old Chinese Canadian Meilin ‘Mei’ Lee (voiced by Rosalie Chiang) which suddenly granted a magical ability to transform into a red panda, when she experiences a strong emotional situation. In addition to manage his magical ability, she also attempts to balance two different lives between becoming the family pride with her mom Ming ‘heavy-hand’ approuch (voiced by Sandra Oh) and embracing his teenage life with fangirling toward a popular boyband and romantic interests toward boys.
Turning Red continues the steak of Pixar Animation Studio’s transformation effort under Chief Creative Officer Pete Docter after Soul (2020) and Luca (2021) in experimenting different visual styles and presenting different stories from various cultural background and distinct target audiences. Pixar’s new approuch is comparable with Studio Ghibli’s filmmaking approuch where Ponyo (2008) showcases a simplistic animation and light-hearted story while Princess Mononoke (1998) features an R-rated gore and aimed for adult audience. This approuch leads toward revival of computer animation movies as an authentic art form after previous decade sees demise of interest toward 3D animation. The new visual style and storytelling approaches helps Pixar differentiate itself from sister studio Walt Disney Animation Studio (Encanto and Frozen)
Director Domee Shi manages to present an authentic art style inspired by Japanese animes and bright pastel colour. This is showcased through the characters diverse facial expressions (such as glittering eyes) and movement animation (one notable moment showcases Mei in a red panda form responded wildly toward his gender opposite crush). The film also manages to recreate water-based painting often found in Chinese hanging scroll through 2D animation.
The movie also presents quirky elements found in an early-teenage era and coming-of-age moment of a 13-years-old girl in a sympathetic manner. The film also should be praised for featuring discussion about situations encountered by women during a puberty moment (such as experiencing sudden romantic crushes and honest conversation about use of sanitary pads during a menstruation period), something which some societies still consider as a taboo topic. The film also successfully describes the struggle of embracing inner self within Asian parenthood in a respectful manner. The script also provides both Mei and her mother with strong characterization for audience to relate with their point-of-views.
In terms of characterization of Chinese culture within the film, Turning Red manages to avoid frequent criticism of orientalism within Hollywood. Recent releases such as Crazy Rich Asians (2018) and Netflix’s Over the Moon (2020) have been criticized for failing to gasp Chinese culture and capturing attention of mainland China audience. Considering the movie describes about Chinese diaspora in Canada, the film manages to demonstrate unique blend of traditional Chinese culture and contemporary western lifestyle within a mainstream feature film.
Beside the themes and animation style, the music also becomes one of the highlights of the movie. Ludwig Goransson manages to demonstrate his expertise in combining traditional Chinese instrumental with contemporary scores such as modern pop music. Award winning songwriters Billie Ellish and Finneas O’Connell manage to establish the fictional boy band 4-Town with catchy soundtracks inspired by 90’s boyband such as Backstreet Boys. Similar with Coco (2017), the filmmakers and composer manage to integrate the song into central storytelling aspect of the film rather than a detachable approach featured in a Disney Animation’s musical. The main highlight of this approach takes place during the final scene where the Cantonese ritual rhythm is combined with the pop music from the fictional boyband.
The filmmakers desire to embrace different animation and music styles, alongside with their success in delivering an honest and relatable coming-of-age story of 13-years-old Chinese Canadian make Turning Red became one of the finest Pixar features.
