When Disney + released “Raya and the Last Dragon” on Friday for premium access streaming, I had mixed feelings before watching it, given Disney’s history of treating women and world cultures in its animated features.
Would there be problems with permission, as in the early days of Disney’s animated films, when Snow White and Sleeping Beauty were kissed while sleeping to “save” it? Would someone be imprisoned just to see her hairdresser’s heart of gold and fall in love with him, as Belle did with the Beast? Would white American actors give voices of characters with whom they have no cultural connection, as happened to the child and the adult Simba?
“Raya” takes place in a country that was once Kumaandra, a peaceful and prosperous country inspired by the countries of Southeast Asia. It was besieged by a plague called the Druun, which is a faceless force that turns people into stone. The Druun overtakes so much of the world that the last dragon, with humanity at stake, concentrates its magic and creates a dragon jewel powerful enough to push the Druun back to wherever he came from.
“It must have been this great inspiring moment, where humanity united over her sacrifice, but instead of people being human, they all fought to own the last remnant of dragon magic,” says Raya. “Boundaries have been drawn, Kumaandra divided, we have all become enemies.”
I do not think Disney intended to release a film about a pandemic that shatters a society in a world besieged by a pandemic and into a completely divided nation – but here we are with COVID -19 and endlessly criticize each other. mishandling the situation.
The film exists in a fantasy world, but it becomes so meticulous what we are currently going through.
“If we don’t stop trusting each other again, it’s just a matter of time before we break up,” Raya’s father tells her. “This is not the world I want you to live in.”
This world in its current state is not one I want to live in, nor are the remnants of Kumaandra, but there is something comforting about the film. I used to look at the Disney animation made by Walt Disney’s team of ‘nine old men’ and did not question whether its contents were harmful. I watched this movie in the opposite way. But it feels different from some of Disney’s other movies.
‘Raya’ hired Kelly Marie Tran, a Vietnamese American, as lead actress and hired screenwriters who are part of the cultures that portray the film. Disney also hired enough cultural experts that the credits had a Southeast Asia Story Trust division and worked with groups such as Laos Angeles, which describes itself as a Los Angeles-based progressive and inclusive movement that identifies those who identify themselves. with one of the 160+ ethnic groups in Laos, ”and the Khmer Arts Academy.
Early critics pointed out that the film mostly uses East Asian actors from China and Korea, and not Southeast Asian actors. But some also said that the performance they see in the film still feels like a good step.
“‘Raya and the Last Dragon’ is so much more than just the latest Disney movie, at least for me,” Justine Calma wrote for the Verge on March 5. ‘Admittedly, I’m not even a big Disney fan. But somehow because of Raya, there’s a little girl in me who’s finally seen. ‘
When I watched this movie, I felt the joy of Disney animation like I had not been since I was a child. All I could think of on the morning of its release was “it feels good.”
It does not just look beautiful, or just have the right character mix of empowered women, empathetic men and beautiful creatures. Not only does it have animation so lifelike that it sometimes looks real. More importantly, it has the kind of storyline I really had to hear after a year in a pandemic hellscape, where my own country seems more divided every day and the goodwill towards each other feels like a low point of all time. , at least in my lifetime.
What struck me so hard is not only that Disney accidentally made the perfect pandemic movie. It also seems that they are doing the right thing by Tran, who experienced intense setbacks and investigation from the Star Wars fandom when she appeared as Rose Tico in ‘Star Wars VII: The Last Jedi’. The opening scene of “Raya and the Last Dragon” even echoes a kind of “galaxy far, far away” images, as all we see is a wasted landscape and Raya drives through it.
“I know what you’re thinking,” she says. A lone man. A dystopian world. A land that perishes. “
It’s almost like the scene is a nod to Star Wars and Tran’s hellish experience, one that abandoned her social media and wrote a powerful piece in the New York Times about what happened. One that Disney could have for her and the other actors of color in the movies and had to protect, as Star Wars co-star John Boyega told Variety.
Tran in this film plays a powerful woman, not one who gets special powers like the live-action Mulan, or one who needs a prince to save her. She is just an ordinary person, with mind and heart, and trying to make a difference. With of course a dragon by her side.
The quest is about saving the world, but it’s really about forgiving one another for what they consider unforgivable, and reaching out to the enemy, even for fear of danger or retaliation.
“There’s still light in this,” says Raya’s father. “There is still hope.” He’s talking about the dragon jewel, but all I could think about was Amanda Gorman’s poem during President Joe Biden’s inauguration. “Because there is always light, if we are just brave enough to see it,” she read. “If only we were brave enough to be that.”