Delightful Animated Girl Hero who Breaks with Disney Traditions

Rating: 7/10 (8 November 2005)

"Mulan" is not quite a chick flick and it's much better than "Pochantas."
It has terrific animation and I forgot I was even watching animation. The script has some funny lines.
The music is not great (the writers didn't ring any bells with me as to their past work) but good lyrics. I was disappointed that the music wasn't as Asianish as "Lion King" is Africanish. And the final rap is a bit off-putting, though the segue into the Stevie Wonder song was fun.
Eddie Murray isn't Robin Williams but he's fun. At least they do use quite a few Asian actors' voices - Wing Na Wen ("E.R."), George Takei ("Star Trek"), B.D. Wong ("Oz") Pat Morita ("Karate Kid").
I think "Mulan" is the first Disney animation post-Katzenberg and there's a couple of digs at him and responses to the criticisms of how he did the girl stars. There was a lot of criticism of how Katzenberg personally insisted on Jasmine in "Aladdin"s impossible Barbie shape and "Mulan" takes that on with a line about how stupid it is to want such a narrow waist. Definitely a much more positive body image movie than under the Katzenberg regime.
There's no dead mother syndrome here, well for Mulan anyway. The Captain's mother isn't mentioned. Not only is there a mom, but even a grandmom. The father is still Freudian - he's wounded. All the Disney dads of daughters have some incapacity or other or tragic flaw.
Refreshingly, there's no wedding at the end with birds chirping as a canopy. The courting is assumed and the grandmom invites the captain to live there forever--but Mulan shuts her up.
(originally written 7/23/1998)