Change Your Image
Cashflow808
Reviews
Sofia the First: Princesses to the Rescue! (2014)
Great Guest Appearance by Mulan
The guest appearance by Mulan was great. She was wearing her military outfit with her hair cut to the length it was when she served in the military, which highlights what she is best known for; on the other hand, her curves (chest, waist, & hips) were prominently visible, leaving no doubt about her gender and highlighting the fact that she is a Disney Princess. Whether on TV or in real life, I have yet to see a woman wearing military clothing that made her curves so prominently visible as was seen here. Mulan was just the right person to appear at the right time for Sofia and Co. - they were faced with a maze of warriors that they simply couldn't figure out how to get past, so it was fitting that someone who had served as a warrior would show up to help.
Tomboy (2011)
Touching, but could be better
This film was touching in many aspects. Laure wanted to be someone she wasn't, and she was accidentally given the opportunity to do so thanks to Lisa talking to her as if she were a boy upon their initial encounter. She crafts a male alter ego, Mikaël, and eventually builds on it, having what resembled a love affair with Lisa under her alter ego. I had a feeling that the truth about "Mikaël" would come out sooner or later, but the way in which it came out (and its aftermath) in the film was quite harsh, IMO. I think the humiliation that Laure endured could have been reduced if Laure's mother had simply accompanied Laure to a gathering of all the kids she had played with and then announced Mikaël's true gender/identity to them at the gathering and then continuing to watch over them. Also, the ending seems rather abrupt. It makes me wonder what Lisa's intentions were - did she simply want to find out Mikaël's true identity, or did she want to build a new relationship with Laure as her true feminine self? Since Lisa had mentioned earlier that "Mikaël" did not exist on the class lists, I would have had her continue by saying something along the lines of "Oh, so you are indeed in my class. See you in class then!"
Hua Mulan (2009)
Mediocre
Although I like films that depict the legendary Mulan, I feel that in this particular film, the producers did a rather poor job in concealing Mulan's gender while she was in disguise. For example, unlike the Disney version, in this version Mulan does not use an alias when enlisting in the military. This immediately caught the attention of a close friend of hers, who recognized who she was, thereby causing Mulan to blackmail him into keeping her true gender secret. Since "Mulan" is a decidedly feminine name in Chinese, it beggars belief that more people didn't question Mulan's gender upon hearing her name. In the film, there were only two people in the military who knew Mulan's true gender before her self-disclosure at the end, but this seems very unrealistic in real life given the facts/circumstances of this film.
My Friend Joe (1996)
Very Touching Film
This was a very touching film. Joe/Joanne was a very pitiful character; she deserved much more sympathy/respect/kindness than she actually got in the movie. I lost track of how many times during the movie I said to myself, "I wish I could hug Joe/Joanne." It was great to see Joe/Joanne find an out for her troubles at the circus by virtue of her friendship to Chris; it was also great for Chris to transform from timid to brave by virtue of this friendship. This was a very special bond between the two, courtesy of the bracelets they exchanged as a symbol of their friendship. This bond wasn't even broken by Joe revealing her true gender (and name) to Chris. Also, thanks to his newly acquired audacity, Chris managed to track down Joe/Joanne after she is taken away by her cruel Uncle Curt, and he even identified Curt as the man who hit him while taking Joanne away. I now wonder if the other boys Chris hung out with (Boyler and co.) see Chris any differently at the end compared to at the beginning. What keeps me from giving it a 10, however, is the fact that I felt Joe/Joanne's true gender was rather obvious from the very beginning (based on the color of her clothes, her relatively high-pitched voice, and the length of her wig hair) - even though no one outside of the circus suspected her of not being a boy until her self-disclosure to Chris and his family.