It’s always been something of a towering irony that the animation house that arguably took the crown from Disney was one that actually belonged to the empire that Walt built. Thanks to state of the art animation, fantastic story telling and concepts that constantly pushed the boundaries of what you’d expect a “kids film” to wield, Pixar released an onslaught of instantly legendary titles that not only managed Disney’s old trick of appealing to all ages, but also proved to be as adept at weaving challenging and timeless material as Studio Ghibli.
However, that didn’t mean that the House of Mouse was suddenly some forgotten relic and after a somewhat impressive (and lucrative) comeback thanks to such films as Tangled, Frozen and Wreck-It Ralph, it delivered Zootopia – arguably the most Pixar Disney film that’s ever existed. Skipping musical numbers in favour of good natured – if measured – allegory and providing some of the best animated chemistry in yonks, Zootopia not only provided a respite for parents sick of hearing “Let It Go” on repeat, but it delivers some pretty nifty social lessons to boot.
Meet Judy Hops, an ambitious bunny from the farming community of Bunnybarrow who believes fiercely in her dream of moving to the big city of Zootopia and becoming the world’s first bunny police officer. Her family of simple carrot farmers are supportive, if understandably terrified at the thought of one of their hundreds of children trying to fight crime where elephants, lions and other such larger creatures dwell – but as the inhabitants of this anthropomorphic world have long since evolved beyond the old predator/prey ways, Judy soon zips through the ranks with perky determination and achieves her goal.
However, reality soon creeps in and beyond the fact that Chief Bogo insists that the diminutive bunny stays permanently on parking duty, Judy finds that there’s still plenty of under-the-surface animosity and mistrust between certain species. Take foxes for example; due to her bunny upbringing, Judy can’t help but instinctively be on her guard – especially when she’s on duty – but her prejudices come to the fore when she encounters slick con man, Nick Wilde.
However, in classic odd couple/buddy movie fashion, the two are forced to work together in order to solve a missing otter case that Bogo has angrily given Hops 48 hours to solve. From here, the mismatched pair soon discover a conspiracy that not only takes in the disappearances of numerous other animals, but seems to hint at a strange malady that’s effecting only predators that’s causing them to revert back to their savage ways. With the fate of the entirety of Zootopia hanging in the balance, Hops and Wilde soon discover that even the mob and the mayor’s office could be implicated in the scandal; but with discrimination everywhere, can Judy manage to fight hers and save the day?
You may think that I might be overselling things, but one of the things that struck me most about Zootopia (other than the weighty themes and jaw-dropping world building) is that Disney seems to have really tried to deliver a family film version of the type of sprawling, corrupt, conspiracy, noir thrillers that James Ellory manages to churn out in novels that are the size of breeze blocks. Obviously, there’s not even a hint of the violence and depravity that befalls the characters that often find themselves tumbling into moral decay, but surprisingly the things that Zootopia does retain is the complex plotting and a rather large dose of racism and xenophobia that afflicts the denizens of Ellory’s world. In fact, the way that Zootopia approaches racism in this film is not unlike the impressive balancing act Pixar pulled off while visualising emotional states in Inside Out and much like how that film could be used to explain processing complex emotions, you could hold Zootopia up as a similar learning tool when it comes to accepting people’s differences. In fact, you’ll be surprised at how far the film pushes it what with jokes concerning everyone certain animal names being pronounced as a slur, the fact that bunnies consider the word “cute” offensive unless it’s coming from another rabbit and it’s social unacceptable to touch a sheep’s wool just to see how it feels.
Of course, a weighty as all that sounds, the filmmakers are far too savvy to let some rather sizable social commentary slow the fun down and not only does the movie inherit Pixar’s for social relevance, but it does a fairly astounding job at creating a city that panders to a huge variety of creatures of every size. Not only do certain areas have different environments such as Tundratown and Sahara Square, but there’s also size appropriate places such as Little Rodentia and the film often uses the size differences to slick, comedic effect. However, the best thing about about the film is the insanely tangible chemistry that exists between Ginnifer Goodwin’s super perky (but impressively not annoying) Judy Hops and Jason Bateman’s sliver tongued Nick Wilde – in fact, if you can judge an animated duo by how much unsettling fan art and disturbing fiction it generates, surely Judy and Nick should go down as one of the greats if only for the infamously jaw-dropping “I Will Survive” comic that surfaced in 2017.
But enough about bizarre comics that feature Disney characters debate abortion, let’s get back to the movie proper and backing up that central relationship that had me genuinely questioning to myself whether a fox and a rabbit should move beyond the platonic stage of their relationship, is some truly great side characters, visual gags and running jokes. It obviously helps that we have the likes of Idris Elba, J.K. Simmons, Jenny Slate and Alan Tudyk providing voices for the rest of cast, but I truly believe that the sequence that has a bunch of sloths working in the DMV could possibly be the greatest comedy sequence of the year. Add to this the sight an Arctic Shew mob boss being flanked by his gargantuan, polar bear henchmen, a running gag about timber wolves and their penchant for howling and numerous references to rabbits being good at “multiplication” and at times you have a family movie that seems to cater for the adults more than it does for the kids as there’s a surprising lack of carefree chase scenes or general tweeness.
Of course, the morals and life lessons soon come, but thankfully Zootopia has such a tight grasp of its tone that it doesn’t suddenly derail everything that’s come before just to make its point. As a result, we have a near perfect family film (What are the carnivores eating? Where are all the reptiles?) that has something important to say, but knows how to present it in a way that still allows everyone involved to have fun. Better yet, I wonder how many impressionable kids watch this and find that it’s a gateway film into cops and robbers crime epics? What’s next, Heat with camels? The Departed with rats? Silence Of The Lambs with actual sheep? Whatever we get, can we get another adventure for Hops and Wilde soon please?
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