Skedoosh! (Blinded by the awesomeness of Kung Fu Panda)

Just got home from seeing Kung Fu Panda, happily it was worth the mostly abysmal trailers that proceeded it, especially the formulaic teen-”comedy” of the summer with the privileged American girl being sent to school in *gasp* England.  Oh but wait, in her effort to get out she falls for a guy who gives her a reason to stay, that would sure be an unforeseen and ironic twist if it wasn’t in the trailer.  And what always happens.  You Don’t Mess with the Zohan might be amusing to me, as someone who finds Adam Sandler sometimes tolerable, though.  I could have done without Wall-E telling me not to pirate DVDs though.

I went in mostly for the fight scenes, that I heard were ace, Jack Black, because he’s just so damn likeable to me even if he plays mostly the same role, and David Cross, because he’s awesome but I wasn’t going to see Alvin and the Chipmunks for him.  I sometimes wish he was more picky about what he picks up.

So anyway, of course the film looks as amazing as you would expect of Dreamworks, the backgrounds and animation both, with the intricate and fluid fights standing out in particular.  I think all the participants seemed very ’solid’, like they really had a presence in their surroundings.  I also really want to sing the praise of the 2D animation at the very beginning, also looked great and set up how Po fantasised about martial arts and the Furious Five.  I loved Tai Lung’s escape sequence in particular, that wall of red arrows looked great and again, acted to set up just how powerful he was very well.

So the performances: I can’t pick out anyone who was bad, Black and Hoffman had great chemistry, I get the feeling Black wrote some of his own lines, especially the opening which reminded me of his Tenacious D persona a great deal, and all the time he really gushed over his idols.  McShane showed the haughty malevolence and emotion that was so sadly wasted on the Golden Compass.  My only complaint about the rest of the main cast is they spoke too little, Jackie Chan’s Master Monkey in particular had maybe 2 lines in the whole thing (though was made more characterful through expression and mime) though David Cross’s Master Crane did at least have his delightfully awkward talk with Po.  I should also say I really enjoyed Michael Clark Duncan’s Rhinoceros Commander, partly because I didn’t know he was in it but recognised him, and also for his bluster and confidence that you know from the start is going to be rather painfully taken from him later.  Angelina Jolie was great as Tigress, definitely the deepest character outside of Po, Shifu and Tai Lung, really cool to see the parallels with Tai Lung and how Shifu raised her differently, but with maybe a somewhat similar outcome, as shown by her slowness to accept Po and decision to act on her own against Tai Lung, longing to win the approval Shifu witheld from her.

That flashback made me care a lot more for her and Shifu, made Tai Lung a more interesting, tragic figure, and Oogway awesome, setting up how powerful he was in dispaching Lung with ease, before he parted the mortal coil and left the ‘weaker’ characters behind for the final battle.  Very good use of the perhaps overused device.

As for the plot, yes it is a case of “slacker is the chosen one just because, and that makes him better than people who worked hard all their life” to a degree, but it is at least done better than I recall seeing elsewhere. I don’t see it as a celebration of sloth (which is something I am very tired of, perhaps exemplified by Homer as he is now in The Smipsons), as we see that Po always had the drive, but felt his dream was unattainable due to his body and clumsiness. The greater triumph was over what he thought was impossible that he didn’t dare try, not quitting when even his master was trying to wash him out, and that though something can seem mystical and unreachable, there’s no “secret ingredient”, you are what you make yourself.

Beyond that, I liked the way things like the finger-hold, Tai Lung’s power and “the secret ingredient of secret ingredient soup” were set up, the only thing more I think I could ask for would be more time for the other characters to shine, especially since the film isn’t especially long.  Apparently this is going to spin into an ongoing franchise, hopefully they will do right by it and possibly expand on those characters if the actors return.

There are a lot of promising films out this summer, with this completing with Iron-Man, Hulk, Dark Knight and Tropic Thunder and more for my money, but I’m certainly glad I spent some of my hard-earned on it.  Not the worst plot on earth, but more importantly a visual delight with endearing characters and superb fantasy martial art sequences.