Lilo and Stitch

Last weekend, Lilo and Stitch, the newest Disney live-action remake was released in theaters. Lilo and Stitch follows escaped alien Stitch as he crash lands on Earth and befriends a lonely girl named Lilo. I was the perfect age when the original Lilo and Stitch came out and it is still one of my favorite Disney movies. Because of that, I was a bit skeptical about them remaking the movie but the trailers slowly won me over.

In general, this is a pretty sweet little family film. The movie does a great job of placing the emotional heart of the story in the relationship between Lilo and Nani. At its core, the movie is actually about Nani, a struggling teen sister who is just trying to make ends meet and provide for her troublemaking sister. When the movie emphasizes this aspect, it is pretty good. I felt that the entire relationship between Lilo, Nani, and Stitch is what made the movie so sweet and endearing. I also liked how the movie elevated Nani as a character. We get to see more of the stress she goes through as well as the part of her life that she put on hold to care for her sister. Lilo and Stitch also does a great job of showing how the stress and business of Nani's life puts strain on her relationship with Lilo causing her to be less attentive. I also thought the girl playing Lilo was good. She is very cute and considering she is acting opposite a CGI alien, does pretty good action. The movie makes the wise decision to go in a more grounded direction. It isn't trying to be a $200 million blockbuster but instead tries to tell a small family story. The movie also supplies a lot of sweet and emotional moments mostly between Nani and Lilo or between Lilo and Stitch, especially in the third act of the film.

While I did like everything about the Nani, Lilo, and Stitch relationship, I didn't care for pretty much everything else about the movie. I didn't think the side characters were very well handled at all. Cobra Bubbles' role is split between two characters making each character half as useful. The same thing happens with David as his role is divided between two characters making both David and Cobra Bubbles less important characters. However, the character that made me the most upset was Jumba. Without Captain Gantu in the movie, Jumbo takes on the villain role in the third act so instead of giving him a bit of redemption and helping Stitch rescue Lilo, he becomes a full-on evil scientist who wants to use Stitch to take down the galactic federation. I felt that this completely ruined the character. I also thought that Zach Galifianakis was the wrong person to play Jumbo. He doesn't give Jumba the iconic accent and just sounds like himself instead of the character. If the character change of Jumba didn't fully ruin the character for me, Zach Galifianakis did.

Overall, at its center, the movie is a very sweet story about Lilo, Stitch, and Nani which is where it shines. However, pretty much everything else about the movie didn't work for me. It is sweet enough and a good watch for the family but it is still just as unnecessary as the other live-action remakes.

Score: 6.5/10 Grade: B- Recommendation: Check it out with the family