Disney Oscar bait

Rating: 5/10 (10 October 2014)

Pocahontas (1995) is popularly regarded as the film which led to the death of the Disney Renaissance. While I am of the opinion that this period reached its peak with Beauty and the Beast (1991), I do agree that this misfire marked the beginning of the end of Disney's second golden age.
While the animation and color palette are gorgeous, and the musical numbers are classic, the character design is overall unexpressive. The story is recycled and dull, and the characters are all one-dimensional. Pocahontas and John Smith may be the most uninspired lovers in the Disney canon, generating little chemistry.
Then there's the historical inaccuracy. The real Pocahontas' life was nothing at all like what is depicted here and I feel it was insensitive of Disney to turn such a painful and bloody part of history into an animated fairy tale for the family crowd. Altering an adult novel like The Hunchback of Notre Dame is no big deal, in my view, but whitewashing over history is much more problematic.
Of course, this movie is also pretentious, trying to be so much more epic and important than it is, trying its best to top the maturity of Beauty and the Beast and nab another Best Picture nomination. It failed miserably and only started the beginning of the end for one of Disney's most triumphant decades.