I have a lot of opinions about Brave and about things surrounding Brave (particularly advertisements for it). So I may end up doing a couple posts about this, but what I want to talk about this time is how unique this movie is for a western animated movie.
First of all, the physical conflict is very unique for a Pixar movie. Fight scenes are the bread and butter of a lot of Japanese animated movies. Sword of the Stranger, Knockin' on Heaven's Door, Rebuild of Evangelion, all of them have awesome climactic fights (some of them linked in my post about anime you should see here). But physical conflict has always been heavily underplayed in western animation. Brave has, in my opinion, the first really good fight scenes in any Pixar movie. For comparison, the first really good western animated fight scene (in my opinion) was in Tarzan.
Here is when someone at Disney got their act together (to be fair, the fight at the end is also pretty cool, but this is the better of the two in my opinion). The fighting has weight, its movement is very clear, the threat of danger is always credible.
That is what makes this fight work. The threat posed by Sabor (the leopard) is real and tangible. Neither party is pulling their punches. The audience believes Tarzan really could get injured or killed during this fight, and the only thing that gives him a chance is his spear and his wits.
Other Disney movies have tried to have cool fight scenes before. Mulan for instance...
You would think Mulan would have good fight scenes, kung fu and all, but Mulan lacks what makes a fight scene thrilling: plausibility.
Everything that happens is so divorced from the rules of reality (you know, physics and all that) that the weight of the threat is lost. Shan Yu just rips through solid wood columns because he feels like it, and then can't move when he has a sword suck in his shirt? That seems inconsistent. Also, why go through all the trouble of using the fireworks? Mulan has his sword, and we already established she's a trained soldier, why not just stab him?
...oh right, kids movie.
I do like Mulan, it's one of my favorite Disney movies, but I like it for its character development and willingness to address gender roles and sexism. I feel they dropped the ball when it came to the physical conflict, which is sad considering that it's ostensibly the climax of the film. Mulan relies too much on gags during the fights; cute acrobatics or tricks that don't actually involve any hitting.
But you don't have to wimp out on the fights just because you have gender roles to address! Look at the tone set by this (pretty old) trailer for Brave.
That bear looks like it could pretty well mess Merida up. Even though she gets the shot off, I don't think any of us think that bear's going down from one arrow. Also, she wasn't aiming at a chandelier that would fall on the bear's head (as you might find anywhere else). She was aiming at the bear!
Now, this trailer was released almost a year ago, and this scene isn't actually in the movie, but the final film maintains this tone in its most serious moments. I'm not going to post any of it here because I don't want to spoil it for you, but you really should go see it. The final fight is incredibly well done.
Actually, that's only scratching the surface of how unusual Brave is. Even aside from the fighting, Brave is the most Japanese of any western animated movie I have ever seen. I'm sure many of you have noticed John Lasseter introduces all of the Disney DVD releases of Studio Ghibli movies, so one can assume that the Ghibli movies have some influence on John (and by extension, the rest of Pixar). But this influence has never been more obvious than in Brave. Just look at this poster!
Merida is Pixar's first heroine, but she's not very much like any Disney princess. She much more resembles Sophie or Chihiro (characters from Studio Ghibli films Howl's Moving Castle and Spirited Away, respectively) in terms of her attitude toward the drama around her. She is a young girl who has a fairly stable life (and one or two significant character flaws), she is exposed to a supernatural force, and through her magical experience, she discovers something about herself. That basic plot is used in several Disney movies including Aladdin, Emperor's New Groove, Brother Bear, and the Princess and the Frog. But what sets Brave apart is how different Merida is as a character from the other Disney protagonists.
Merida has no romantic aspirations, which immediately sets her apart from everyone except Kenai (Brother Bear), and she's also a girl, which sets her apart from every protagonist in that list except Tiana (Princess and the Frog). The biggest difference between Merida and all of the previously mentioned characters is that she seeks out the magic that affects her life so profoundly. Every other protagonist simply had the magic thrust upon them by either fate or a bad-guy, but Merida sees a problem in her life and attempts to fix it.
Brave's plot also resembles a Ghibli film in that there is no real antagonist. Much like in Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, or Nausicaa, the characters of the story are fairly morally ambiguous. They all have motivations other than "be good" or "be evil". Sure there are un-good characters in Brave; Mor'du is threatening and the witch is creepy, but they are both about as evil as Yubaba (Spirited Away) or Lady Eboshi (Princess Mononoke). These characters just have separate goals that bring them into conflict.
Brave is also very Japanese in terms of its visual direction...
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| We're not so different, you and I... |
Especially when depicting the forest, Brave resembles Princess Mononoke more than it resembles any Pixar or Disney movie. The feel of the world is also extremely similar with its relative abundance of supernatural creatures, the simultaneous beauty and danger of the forest, the warring clans subplot, and the credible mortality of the characters.
Other movies have superficially tried to be Japanese before (I'm looking at you Teen Titans: Trouble in Tokyo) and many will try after, but just in terms of feel, Brave is, in my opinion, the most Japanese western animated film yet produced.
...Speaking of which. Below is the Japanese trailer for Brave.
Brave may borrow heavily from Studio Ghibli both visually and thematically, but it did not borrow its plot from them. Brave is still about a girl's relationship with her mother and to her culture. It is not about 'violating the laws of the forest' as this trailer would lead you to believe...
Japan, what are you doing? Why would you replace the plot of a perfectly good movie with the most overdone anime plot ever (aside from young man must find his way in a world in chaos)? It turns out people are terrible at advertising for movies in every country, but that's probably a story for another post.
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