Critics praise Pixar's 25th feature "Turning Red"

Domee Shi's adult comedy turning red she's wowing critics with her heartwarming message, beautiful animation, and humorous version of being a girl going through a supernaturally awkward phase. The new Pixar feature, which debuts as a Disney + exclusive on March 11, boasts a 94% positive review score on Rotten Tomatoes and 85 on MetaCritic.

turning red centers on a self-confident and stupid XNUMX-year-old named Mei (voiced by Rosalie Chiang) who is torn between remaining a respectful daughter to her mother (Sandra Oh) and the chaos of adolescence in the Toronto-era world. . As if the changes to her interests of hers, her body and her relationships weren't enough, it turns out that Mei has inherited a hairy family legacy: when she's too horny, she transforms into a giant red panda.

Here's what some of the critics say:

Much like the recent Encanto, this is a film with no real villain other than family expectations: Ming is focused on order and discipline and follows what she thinks are the rules, but Shi and Julia Cho's script understands. how much Meimei and Ming are the products of their relationships with their respective mothers ... For all of its unforgettable films, Pixar has rightfully caught fire for the lack of women in the director's chair, and Turning Red serves as an exemplary object of universal but recognizable narrative which comes from offering a female perspective in a family-friendly comedy.

- Alonso Duralde, The Wrap

“Until I saw turning red, I had no idea how much I needed the cute overload of a giant red panda running across the rooftops of downtown Toronto… First of all, it's a pleasure to see Toronto play by itself and not replace some place in the United States with less tax breaks. Second, tying a mix of tradition and fantasy to the city's vibrant Chinatown community gives the film a cultural specificity, while Shi's light touch provides universal appeal on friendship themes, the push-pull of complex mother-to-life relationships. daughter and the struggle of early adolescence to gain independence and find out what kind of person you want to be ... Turning Red is original, funny and tender, a fond reminder that adolescence is a period of life not easily tamed, and sometimes the animal within us requires liberation. "

- David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter

“The red panda then becomes an allegory of what girls inherit from their mothers and how we can harness the power to control our destiny. The panda also acts as a substitute for intergenerational trauma, although it could easily be interpreted as a trait worth concealing that was passed down from the mother ... There are some small missteps in the film, such as "my body, my choice. ". 'joke that goes wrong and a hyper-capitalist' panda hustle 'plot in which Mei chooses to monetize the quality of her more special than her without any kind of reflection or reckoning. But overall, Turning Red manages to strike all the right emotional notes - and its true magic lies in its blatant celebration of the joyful chaos of childhood within a proud Asian immigrant family.

- Hannah Bae, The San Francisco Chronicle

“… As [Luca, Brave and Inside Out], we deal with the pains of youth and how growing up affects the family dynamic as reflected through extravagant presumption. Playwright Julia Cho and co-writer-director Domee Shi at least tried to add some specificity to the dog ear formula and boldly, for the territory, addressing the elements of the less historically Disney-friendly experience. When Mei Lee first transforms into the red panda, her mother assumes the panic behind the bathroom door is due to her first period and although it shouldn't be seen as a big deal, for Disney (a study still doing pretending that LGBTQ people exist in their live action, not to mention cartoons, movies), is a medium-sized passage and is handled with no expected shyness. Mei Lee and her friends are also proud fans of the boyband 4 * Town, which apes N * Sync and one of its triggers is the feelings they arouse within her, another step towards the realization that the teenage experience has more nuances. than the firm has ever wanted to admit. "

- Benjamin Lee, The Guardian