My Review of Mulan (2020)

 

Written by Rick Jaffa & Amanda Silver & Lauren Hynek & Elizabeth Martin

Directed by Niki Caro

Mulan: "Loyal, brave, and true... it is my duty to protect my family."

It's been a strange time with this movie, huh? Originally due for release back in March prior to worldwide lockdown and in between various controversy and a general state of divisiveness, Disney+ surrendered to the fact that it wasn't going to be enough to tempt cinema goers back into theatres and decided to released on their streaming but with a price. The question: is it worth it?

I have to admit the answer is probably not, unless it's for families, in which case they're likely getting a bit of a bargain but for everyone else, maybe not so much. In terms of live action remakes, this take on the beloved 1998 fan favourite is definitely something of a mixed bag. Unlike last year's The Lion King, this is not a shot for shot remake of the original but there are a lot of changes and for those who loved the original, perhaps too many changes for it's own good.

The basic story remains the same though - our titular heroine played Yifei Liu defies the normal conventions of young girls and happens to be a bit of an outcast among her village and even her family. Her parents attempts to have the Matchmaker (Cheng Pei-pei) marry her off fail and when Mulan's father (Tzi Ma) is unable to fight in battle, Mulan takes his armor and place when joining up with the training camp. It's where one of the noteworthy of changes to this movie happens.

In the original movie, Mulan served under a commanding officer named Li Shang, whom she later fell in love with. In this version, Li Shang is replaced with a commanding officer named Tung (Donnie Yen) while fellow soldier, Honghui (Yoson An) serves as an initial rival, but later implied potential love interest on the basis that this movie might do enough to generate a sequel and explore that particular plot strand.

As characters go, they're decent enough replacements for Li Shang and while I get the logistics behind the character's omission, the romance between Mulan and Honghui feels more downplayed compared to the movie. Of course they're not the only changed or omitted characters here.

I could complain about the lack of Mushu but given the tone aimed for this movie, I get why they lost him and having Cricket as an actual human character and fellow soldier gave us one comedic character whose pratfalls were thankfully not overdone. Actually all the supporting soldier characters were given a decent enough amount of screentime and the general comradery worked well enough.

As for the villain, well, we got two of them and out of the two, it's clear that Gong Li's witch Xian Ling worked the best. I mean there was some pointed commentary on the similarities between Xian and Mulan as both women have the ch'i, are generally outsiders, are essential to their rival men led tribes but ultimately their destinies take different paths. Not to spoil what happened to Xian, but she's a character that worked far better than the main villain.

In the original, the main villain in question was Shan Yu who wanted to rule China but here, it's Bori Khan (Jason Scott Lee) whose motives are more driven by revenge against the current Emperor (Jet Li). As villains go, he's a fairly weak villain, a bit too obviously sexist in parts (something which the original movie managed to avoid with Shan Yu) and while his fight scene with Mulan does work, his defeat definitely felt like a whimper overall.

In terms of central performances, I think Yifei Liu does a decent job in bringing the character to life and most of the changes to Mulan herself work well enough in the movie's favour. In spite of one or two moments, I do think the central themes are handled well enough, if a bit heavy handed. Mulan's decision at the end regarding her military future to be left on a cliffhanger does feel like the movie tempting fate, even more so in the current climate.

- This movie opened with scenes of Mulan as a child, excluded her dog Little Brother, renamed her horse Black Wind and gave her a sister, Xiu (Xana Tang) who has a fear of spiders. Original Mulan actor, Ming Na-Wen has a cameo towards the end of the film.

- I noticed that they changed the opening of the Shanghai Disney castle for this movie. 

- Standout music: Both Christina Aguilera and Yifei Liu's versions of Reflection and Aguilera's Loyal, Brave And True.

- Chronology: Early Northern and Southern Dynasties, China. 

Mulan is definitely not a perfect live action version of a beloved Disney Classic but it's not quite the disaster area that some have said. The central performances are mostly strong as are the fight sequences but the lack of certain characters and musical numbers definitely does detract from completely enjoying and Bori Khan could've been a better realised baddie. I don't know how this will fare overall on Disney+ premium access strategy but I guess time will tell if this will do well enough to generate the sequel it's clearly trying to set up.

Rating: 7 out of 10