Enter The Panda

Rating: 8/10 (8 June 2008)

A long time ago, in Ancient China, there live up in a mountain top dojo, five formidable warriors under the strict guidance of their red panda master, Shifu (voiced by Dustin Hoffman). Together as a mighty force to be reckoned with, these ferocious fighters battle evil and help to defend the innocent folks of a nearby village.
One day, Shifu's teacher, Oogway (voiced by Randall Duk Kim), an elderly tortoise, has a premonition that Shifu's former disciple, a snow leopard by the name of Tai Lung (voiced by Ian McShane) will escape from his fortress prison and return to terrorize the village and the dojo. With little time left, the moment has come for the prophesied Dragon Warrior to emerge and take hold of the Dragon Scroll and its mysterious secret.
During a ceremony to elect the destined hero after the five disciples of Shifu had demonstrated their Kung Fu abilities, an animal came falling from the heavens while making botched attempts to see the disciples in action. Eventually, Oogway pinpointed the giant panda as the One much to the shock of Shifu and his disciples.
Meet Po (voiced by Jack Black), reluctant hero and assistant at his father's noodle store, whose only interest seem to be eating and fantasizing about being a great Kung Fu warrior.
Kung Fu Panda is a fresh direction for DreamWorks Animation in cultural sense following the Shrek series and other animated features like Madagascar and Bee Movie. New challenges also arise for the animation team, most notably in the well choreographed fight scenes. Excellent attention had been given to the Chinese environment and as always with previous DreamWork's features, the movie's graphically top notched as the CGI feature opens with an explosive introduction that has a much more traditional animated look than the rest of the movie. Just pay attention to the swaying fur on Po.
The plot execution is good and so does the character development, especially for the leads like Po and Shifu. My only complaints up to these point is the under-used voice talent of Jackie Chan (voicing the highly agile disciple of Shifu, Monkey) who seem to given only pathetic one liners to sprout, thus unnecessarily making him the least talkative of the Five. Understanding how terrible his English pronunciation can be, he should at best be given the odd role of speaking Chinese like the Amazing Yen of Ocean's Eleven fame.
The rest of the character roster include the members of Shifu's Five, Tigeress (voiced by Angelica Jolie), leader and most deadly of the band, Crane (voiced by David Cross), an ace in aerial combat, Viper (voiced by Lucy Liu), a snake with lighting fast strikes and Mantis (voiced by Seth Rogen), a critter with very strong arms.
While the disciples are rather light hearted about Po's special appointment despite earlier uncertainties about his abilities, Tigress is still very much against his place in the dojo and convinced that the Five are able to defeat the evil Tai Lung without him. Shifu was very doubtful as well but the final wishes of Oogway leaves him with little choice. A montage of scenes began to reveal the reasons behind Shifu's reluctance to train Po as memories of a young Tai Lung being tutored by the pint sized master flashed across. Ultimately, betrayal and guilt drove him to attempt control over circumstances.
Emotional moments in some scenes of Kung Fu Panda delivers but gets a little too sentimental at times. Still, they help us to understand the problems of the key characters and the way they had to dealt with their shortcomings. Positive credits also have to given to the voice acting of Dustin Hoffman and especially Jack Black who is able to articulate the dilemmas and goofiness of Po.
While it has a healthy dose of fast action and ridiculous martial art moves, Kung Fu Panda, like many animated features targeted at kids, also has its presentation of life lessons, the core one being that the belief in oneself despite personal disadvantages will bring out the best in the individual. Some viewers will probably much dismissed those as clichés but it will certainly make many feel good about facing life's challenges.
With a balanced plot, interesting characters and of course, good old Kung Fu, this well crafted animated feature is no doubt the feature to watch for this year. Competitors for the Annies should get intense with entries from Blue Sky Studio (Horton Hears A Who!) and the yet-to-be-released Wall-E by Pixar, vying for the 'Best.....' spots.
Meanwhile, you can expect the kids to be tickled by Po's clownish antics and the older folks entertained as well, by the main sell (Kung fu, of course) of the movie.