I knew the story and the characters, and was not disappointed with this current rendition of this classic Disney/Kipling.
It was always beautiful to watch the almost perfectly realistic models of the animals.
Mowgli looked the part and seemed to handle the physical side of his performance as the only live performer, but his acting at times made me think of 'Anakin from the Phantom Menace' which is not good for a comparison. It was also not a good feeling to see cuts, scrapes and scars on Mowgli as the movie progressed. This is realistic for the amount of action, but it made me uncomfortable seeing this in an almost naked kid getting abused and almost killed by half the jungle.
The two times the movie broke out into song, also didn't really fit with this version either. If it had 5 or ten songs, you wouldn't notice, but those two moments really stood out and dumbed the movie down to me.
All the voices were pretty good, except Christopher Walken who seem woefully miscast and as King Louie and Bill Murray as/and the too cartoony Baloo character I also didn't really care for either.
It was also odd/unsettling that all the main characters were intelligent, but other animals seemed retarded (hedgehog?) or just normal animals? The monkeys and elephants in particular didn't talk, and these are two of the smartest most human-like in real life so this was really weird.
On the other hand, Idris Elba was gold as Sheer Khan and Scarlett Johansson's Kaa is perfect, like her voice performance in 'Her' she was wonderful as the hypnotic snake villain.
Had me in tears at times, all in all good, honest Disney fun in the spirit of the best of them like 'Lion King', Aladdin or Toy Story.
It was always beautiful to watch the almost perfectly realistic models of the animals.
Mowgli looked the part and seemed to handle the physical side of his performance as the only live performer, but his acting at times made me think of 'Anakin from the Phantom Menace' which is not good for a comparison. It was also not a good feeling to see cuts, scrapes and scars on Mowgli as the movie progressed. This is realistic for the amount of action, but it made me uncomfortable seeing this in an almost naked kid getting abused and almost killed by half the jungle.
The two times the movie broke out into song, also didn't really fit with this version either. If it had 5 or ten songs, you wouldn't notice, but those two moments really stood out and dumbed the movie down to me.
All the voices were pretty good, except Christopher Walken who seem woefully miscast and as King Louie and Bill Murray as/and the too cartoony Baloo character I also didn't really care for either.
It was also odd/unsettling that all the main characters were intelligent, but other animals seemed retarded (hedgehog?) or just normal animals? The monkeys and elephants in particular didn't talk, and these are two of the smartest most human-like in real life so this was really weird.
On the other hand, Idris Elba was gold as Sheer Khan and Scarlett Johansson's Kaa is perfect, like her voice performance in 'Her' she was wonderful as the hypnotic snake villain.
Had me in tears at times, all in all good, honest Disney fun in the spirit of the best of them like 'Lion King', Aladdin or Toy Story.