Dir. Niki Caro
The live action Disney recreations of their animated classics have been on a remarkable streak of mediocrity. Aside from maybe The Jungle Book (which benefits from being not particularly beloved), these films have been meticulous visual recreations of the animated movies at the expense of all the life and soul. Tragically, Mulan doesn’t break with that pattern. The marketing for the film heavily emphasized that this movie would endeavor to stick close to the original Chinese epic and not the animated version, but its simultaneous and flagrant attempts to appeal to nostalgia for the 1998 iteration meant it did neither successfully. The end result is a movie that’s ridiculous and instantly forgettable, which would have been disappointing at any point but absolutely chafes with a $30 price tag.
The story remains mostly the same as the one general audiences are familiar with, Mulan (Yifei Liu) pretends to be a man and takes her father’s place in the draft after China is invaded, this time by Rourans (not Huns) and a witch named Xianniang (Li Gong). Unlike the animated version which credited Mulan’s intelligence and strategic mind for her success as a soldier, this movie highlights the concept of Chi. Mulan’s natural abundance of it makes her a natural parkour expert and fighter, exemplified by her doing tricks and flips off a roof while chasing a rogue chicken as a child. However, women with powerful chi are considered witches apparently, so she must keep these talents hidden until they become necessary in the battle against the invaders. Although I’m not opposed to the inclusion of magic, it’s odd that this “grounded retelling” chooses to say that the two prominent women in the film succeed mostly due to supernatural ability rather than extraordinary capability.
This movie was very oddly paced, for the first half of the movie I had the sensation that I’d accidentally put the film in fast forward- things were happening but meant nothing because the emotional beats were not given a chance to breathe. For example in the ‘98 Mulan, Mulan’s decision to take her father’s place is given a fair bit of time. The music rises, tension builds, lightning flashes, the iconic scene of her cutting her hair with the family sword, Mulan taking a moment to look over her family as she replaces her hair clip with the conscription notice before sneaking off into the night. In the live action, she picks up the sword, the camera spins, she’s in full armor and then she leaves. It takes all of 20 seconds, with negligible music and none of the emotional resonance. Instead that time goes to a montage of her riding her horse to the military encampment that serves no purpose except for some nice looking wide shots of the terrain. This prioritizing of pretty cinematography (of which there is a lot!!) over emotional depth is pretty emblematic of the whole film.
The characters and the relationships between them suffered similarly. Mulan herself is bland, she has none of the humor or ingenuity of her 2D counterpart, and while motivated by her familial love, her few scenes with them are so wooden it’s near impossible to care. Mulan’s loving father who reassures her even after the debacle with the matchmaker in 1998 is replaced with a father who seems to have stopped having patience for his daughter’s uniqueness by the age of 10. Mulan’s quirky grandmother, who clearly set an example for and obliquely encouraged Mulan’s rule breaking is replaced with a sister who is merely on-screen.
Mulan’s fellow soldiers also get their personalities and story arcs cut down into nothingness. I would challenge anyone (who hasn’t seen the original) to remember their names…or even to tell them apart. Yao, Po, and Ling had separate and distinct personalities which should make them easily discernible even without the exaggerated character designs of the animation, but instead they’re basically a Huey, Dewey, and Louis triple act without even the kindness of color coding to know who they’re supposed to be. Li Shang (RIP King) is broken into two characters, a fellow trainee named Honghui (Yoson An) and Commander Tung (Donnie Yen, who deserves better), and Mulan forms a meaningful relationship with neither. The Commander’s most impactful action is to *checks notes* tell Mulan to believe in herself. At the end of the movie, there’s a moment with Honghui that was a callback to a moment I couldn’t even remember.
I’ve heavily compared this movie to the animated version because although this movie is allegedly a very different thing, it repeatedly goes out of its way to remind you the animated one exists. “This movie isn’t a musical because it’s down to earth and serious” says the marketing. Yet in the film characters say lines from the songs in an awkward conversational format which only reminds the audience they’d rather listen to the song. Indeed, it’d be nice to hear any music at all. For some reason much of this film is near silent, with no score of note accompanying the story. This movie even includes the lucky cricket, but for no reason I can fathom, make him instead a person named Cricket, who tells his new friends that his mom calls him lucky. For the first hour of the movie, scenes play out so similarly to the animation that the variations that do exist don’t make this movie feel unique so much as a “let me copy your homework, but I’ll change it just enough the teacher doesn’t notice”. We all notice.
The most apparent difference, apart from the crimes against Li Shang, are the villains. Shan-Yu is replaced with Bori Khan (Jason Scott Lee), the son of a previous invader who wants to destroy the emperor who’d defeated his father. He is assisted by Xianniang, a witch he verbally abuses despite the fact that she does most of the actual fighting. She single handedly infiltrates various Chinese strongholds and battles all the guards. On actions alone she is the far greater threat but for reasons unknown she’s subservient to this man who literally calls her a dog. Her primary purpose seems to be to show Mulan that women can be powerful too- which seems a little insulting to Mulan. Shan Yu may not be the most charismatic in the Disney Villain Pantheon, but he was intelligent, menacing and a worthy adversary. Bori Khan is none of those, and a waste of an opportunity to bring in the Khan family and use real history to the movie’s benefit.
Despite the scores of flaws with the storytelling, there are some highlights. When this movie looks good, it looks great! Gorgeous wide shots and some very fun fight choreography which takes advantage of the quasi-magical nature of Chi in this film. The costumes are pretty exquisite, even the extras are wearing brightly colored clothes which keeps the background of scenes very visually pleasing. Xianniang in particular has wonderfully detailed costumes. Disney’s armored gown game is really going from strength to strength. Unfortunately, when it doesn’t look good, it looks cheap, The CGI is so egregious in some scenes, I was comparing it to Shark Boy and Lava Girl. It’s 2020 and even the most casual viewer knows a green screen when they see one, some practical effects and set building would have done this a world of good, because when they are used that effort pays off in spades.
Mulan may do well with children over the holiday premiere weekend, something colorful and passably fun for audiences new to Mulan, but it will be forgotten pretty much immediately after. Much like the Lion King, Aladdin, and Beauty and the Beast live actions before it, the smell of soulless cash grab taints anything this movie may have been trying to do, and that isn’t much. I’d like to think this will be the final nail in the live action coffin, as we have more than enough evidence that these remakes are being churned out like nutritionally-deficient fast food, but as long as Disney continues to profit, it seems we will be neck deep in them for the foreseeable future. Dishonor.