Josh Reviews Turning Red

In the new Pixar film Turning Red, we meet Meilin Lee, a 13 year old Chinese-Canadian girl, living in Toronto in 2002.  Mei is extremely close with her mother and has a tight group of friends at school.  She’s an overachiever, and she works hard to make her family — especially her mother — proud.  But Mei’s perfectly balanced life falls to pieces when, one morning, she wakes up to discover she’s transformed into a huge, red panda.  She quickly realizes that she can will herself back into her normal human form, but whenever she experiences a strong emotion, she bursts back into being a huge, fluffy, slightly smelly red panda.

First of all, bravo to the folks at Pixar for making this spirited metaphor for a girl’s experience going through puberty and getting her first period.  I know there’s been news made online by some who object to this as the premise for a Pixar/Disney film.  But I think it’s wonderful for them to have made a story that so directly addresses this experience that half of the population of Planet Earth have or will go through!!  I think that’s terrific, and I applaud director and co-writer Domee Shi (who directed the beautiful Pixar short Bao a few years ago) and her team for their bold choices.  (Worth noting: Ms. Shi is the first woman to be the sole director of a Pixar film.)

My favorite aspect of the film was how well they depicted the very specific joys and tortures of being a tween girl.  (Being a parent of girls very much in this age range, I really appreciated this.  And my daughters really dug the film.)  I appreciated the time the film spent exploring Mei, and how she has to deal with the often-conflicting thoughts and desires swirling within her, and the way she often feels pulled in different directions.  Mei wants to be a dutiful daughter who spends time with her family and, in specific, her mother, but she also wants to hang out with her friends and go to a boy-band concert.  She’s a follow-the-rules “A” student, but she also feels the urge to rebel and push against her boundaries.  She enjoys connecting with her Chinese heritage and helping out at the Temple her family runs, but she’s also a modern assimilated Canadian kid who has a life and a culture that her parents don’t quite understand.  She’s moving from being a child whose world is her close group of female friends, to being a young adult who’s started to doodle fantasies about the cute boys she dreams about.  There are a lot of levels to this character and to this story, which is to the film’s credit.

I also loved how specifically the film is rooted in such a specific time and place, based on Ms. Shi’s own experiences growing up as a Chinese-Candaian kid in Toronto.  Again, some online have criticized the film for this specificity — thinking it makes the film “too niche”.  To the contrary, I think the films with the most universal appeal have also had this kind of specificity of time and place.  The difference is, this time we’re focusing on a non-white character in a non-American (and also not-completely fantastical) setting.  I loved how personal this story clearly was to Ms. Shi and her collaborators.  I think that shines through the film — in so many tiny little moments and details — in a very endearing way.

As always, the animation in this Pixar film was beautiful.  I was intrigued that, for the second film in a row (after Luca), the film sports a very different look and animation style than what I’d come to expect from Pixar.  For example, take a look at the very unusual and distinct shapes that Mei’s mouth makes.  They reminded me a lot of the look of Charles Schultz’s Peanuts!  Then there is the way that Mei and her friends’ eyes turn all huge and sparkly when they get excited; a look strongly influenced by certain anime and cartoons like Sailor Moon.  Not all of these choices spoke to me, but I think it’s cool that the Pixar team is willing to expand the style of their films and to give their films each a distinct look and approach.  (Also: I will comment that I loved the extremely adorable look of Mei in her red panda form.  Those Pixar animators made her fur look so soft and fluffy!  I was impressed.)

Young Rosalie Chiang was terrific as Mei — she gives her such spirit and energy!  It’s a beautiful and nuanced performance.  Sandra Oh is perfect as Mei’s mother Ming Lee.  I love the depth Ms. Oh gives to Ming; she’s able to be in opposition to Mei at certain critical moments in the film, but we never lose sight of Ming as a realistic person of her own.  (In fact, it’s one of the strengths of the film that the story explores Ming almost as much as it does Mei.)  Ava Morse, Maitreyi Ramakrishnan, and Hyein Park are all strong as Mei’s friends Miriam, Priya, and Abby.  I really enjoyed all three characters and I liked that the film allowed them each to have a very distinct look and personality.  I also loved hearing the very distinct voice of James Hong (Chinatown, Blade Runner, Batman: Soul of the Dragon) pop up as the local elder Mr. Gao.

Once again, this is another beautiful new piece of work from those geniuses at Pixar.  Well done.

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