I went into Zootopia
expecting to enjoy it. Disney Animation
Studios has really stepped up their game in the past few years, delivering hit
after hit that, if not overt critical successes, are of the requisite quality
to become part of the popular culture and return Disney to its days of former
glory. So, yes, Zootopia seemed like yet another entry into this stream of quality
children’s entertainment. But this film
is more than good; it is nothing short of brilliant in premise, execution, and
pure entertainment value. This is going
to be one of the most intellectually discussed popular films of the year, which
is an astounding feat for any animated film, let alone one exclusively
populated by talking animals.
Judy Hopps (an appropriately chipper yet subtly nuanced
Ginnifer Goodwin) is a rabbit from the rural countryside who dreams of being a
police officer, despite there never having been a rabbit police officer before
in a profession dominated by larger, aggressive animals. When she graduates at the top of her class
from the police academy, Judy moves to Zootopia, a multi-environmental city
that boasts a cultural diversity of almost every species of animal. She isn’t taken seriously at her job and
is assigned to parking ticket duty, so Judy becomes motivated to investigate a
missing person case that the rest of the department is unconcerned about due to
the species of the animal in question.
With the help of a con artist fox named Nick (a perfectly cast Jason
Bateman), Judy places her career on the line to unravel a mystery that is
bigger than she could have imagined.
Structurally, the film plays out like a buddy cop detective
adventure, with Judy and Nick not liking each other much and gradually changing
their minds as they discover more about one another. They investigate a rogue’s gallery bizarre
one-off characters in a fashion not dissimilar to The Big Lebowski, and there isn’t a single joke in this film that
doesn’t land. Not only are the film’s
mystery beats genuinely engrossing and will keep you guessing until the very
end, but the film uses comedy to make itself palatable to both kids and adults
alike. Whether it’s a visit to an animal
nudist colony (seriously) or to a DMV run exclusively by sloths (a joke
made no less funny by how obvious it is), Zootopia
is wickedly inventive with its humor and uses its premise to its fullest
potential.
And that potential includes some incredibly poignant
commentary on the state of race relations in America. You read that right. Zootopia
uses its premise to paint an allegorical portrait of the nature of prejudice
and how people of different races cohabitate in an urban setting. It’s not terribly subtle about it, but it
also doesn’t assume that its audience is stupid or that the subtext will go
over their heads. This is a film that
wants to make a point, and it does so in ways that are at times absurdly
humorous, but also in tragic and unexpected turns. The relationship between Judy and Nick is
especially symbolic of this, as Judy has been told all her life that foxes are
to be feared and not trusted, and Nick has issues of his own related to how
others perceive his species, so their eventual coming together as friends and
the mistakes they make even as friends are shockingly true-to-life in how
people of different races interact with each other in America.
I expect Zootopia
to be a huge hit with critics and audiences alike, but I also suspect that a
fair bit of controversy will revolve around the film for quite some time. It isn’t afraid to call out police profiling
practices or the conditioned prejudices that affect us all, and that’s going to
rub some people the wrong way. But
that’s why this is such an important film; this is going to teach an entire
generation of kids that racism isn’t just something you do, but something that
each of us struggles to confront within ourselves, even when we think we’re
being reasonable or prudent. Hopefully,
by being presented in such an entertaining package, more than a few adults can
take that lesson to heart as well. Zootopia is probably going to be one of
the smartest, funniest films of the year, so it would be a disservice to
yourself to miss out.
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