Movie Thoughts: Mulan (1998)

• Released: 19 June 1998
• Directed by: Tony Bancroft, Barry Cook
• Running time: 1 hr 28 min
• Rating 4.5/5

Synopsis

In order to protect her elderly father, a young woman disguises herself as a man and participates in a war in his stead.

My Thoughts

So after going through all these Renaissance films again and being almost done with them, I've got to do the obligatory picking of my favorite. Which one is it? Well, I hate to be captain obvious, but it's The Lion King. That said, I found it much more difficult to pick a second favorite. There's so much good stuff in here (and some not-so-good stuff, see Pocahontas). But with only Tarzan of the Renaissance left and me remembering not liking that one as much, I think it's safe to say that Mulan will be my pick for second favorite.

This movie is just great in so many aspects. It looks beautiful, it's heartfelt, it's one of Disney's first real girl power stories, the songs are good and memorable, the villains are very intimidating, the heroine is great, and the comic relief is not all that bad. 

Yeah, okay, so I usually have a real bone to pick with the Disney comic reliefs, being notoriously not fond of them, but I actually thought Ling, Chien-Po and Yao were really funny, especially after they bonded with Mulan. I'm not the biggest fan of Mushu, but he's by far not as annoying as he could've been and some other Disney comedy reliefs are. 

I know that this movie isn't perfect. The design of the Huns is arguably racist, it's not fully accurate to Chinese culture and some stuff just hasn't aged as well in general, but there at least is a lot of good to make up for it. It's memorable, it's intense, it's funny, it's charming, it's heartfelt, and exactly when it needs to be.

I really don't have that much to say on this one, it's just really solid and one of the Disney movies I love revisiting the most.