A Review of “Turning Red (2022)”

 

Pixar returns with another movie that is, unfortunately, going straight to Disney+ with little recognition or fanfare about it. Pixar movies were usually the animated movies that everyone was talking about but I barely heard anyone talk about this one. The premise is “Mei Lee is a 13-year-old girl who is torn between being her mother’s obedient daughter and the chaos of her youth. As if that were not enough, when she gets too excited, she turns into a big red panda”. Is this a sleeper hit or is this going to be a Pixar movie people forget?

Let’s get the obvious out of the way first. This movie is visually great with its phenomenal animation. The character designs, the city and the panda itself are all wonderfully pleasant. There is a lot of anime-inspired influences within the film and it certainly shows in the visuals. It’s a mostly grounded movie but when the magical stuff happens, the usual Pixar magic occurs and it is great! For example, there is a nightmare sequence and it is just ridiculously weird, which I love. The cinematography is great as usual with some stellar shots. Ludwig Göransson who is the music composer for Black Panther, Tenet and The Mandalorian is composing for Turning Red (2022). He does a good job with his utilization of Chinese wind instruments, which helps capture the feel of the film. There is also a music segment that combines Cantonese chants with a pop song and Ludwig is somehow able to make that work!

Turning Red is a coming of age story which has been overdone and it is also obvious from the first 10 minutes what the message at the end is going to be. Yet despite that, I came out enjoying the story and being completely satisfied by where the characters end up. The main character, Mei, and her relationship with her mother is the heart of the film. It’s a good focus as I found their love for each other very heart-warming. Thus, when there is a conflict between them, it is genuinely quite sad to see which shows how effective the movie was. Likewise, the friendship between Mei and her friends is also very touching. It’s also the first Pixar film to focus on Asian culture which I appreciate. There isn’t a lot of western films that focus on Asian culture so it was nice that Pixar was willing to do so.  It does have a lot of Asian culture in it but I don’t think it ever gets to the point that it isolates non-Asian’s enjoyment of it.

However, one big gripe I have about this film is its very cringy humour. Instead of having the humour done naturally or in a smart way, they go for this weirdly silly humour and I never found it funny. For example, there is a moment where someone twerks their butt in someone’s face and I just found it incredibly stupid. I’m also a bit mixed on the voice performance of Mei the main character. While the actress, Rosalie Chiang, can effectively portray a 13-year-old, probably because the actress is around that age, the tone of her voice is almost the same in every scene. It’s noticeable because every other major voice actor and actress have more oomph in their voice work compared to her. That is just me being overly picky though but for Rosalie’s first proper acting role, I think she does a good job.

My next point is a very controversial one but I think this is a niche film because of its targeted audience. The reason is having the main characters be 13-year-old girls obsessed with boy bands. The first 10 minutes of the movie is very off-putting because of the hyperactive nature of the main lead Mei. I found it difficult to connect with the main character because of these reasons. The fact that the main focus is Mei wanting to watch and daydream about the boys in this band is just hard to sympathize with. The film is also a metaphor for puberty with a blatant line about tampons being associated with Mei turning to a Panda. The director has clearly stated that the title “Turning Red” is an allegory for a young woman’s life. This element of sexual repression being in a family movie/ Pixar movie is just weird and will alienate a majority of the audience.

Overall, I am glad that Pixar tried to do something unique. It has a heart-warming family story in it that is unfortunately squandered by how the main character is written. It’s great that Asians are getting more representation in western movies but I don’t think this was the exact right approach. It is still an enjoyable coming of age story and I think the good elements outweigh the weird negatives of Turning Red.