Lilo and Stitch was released on June 16th, 2002. It is written and directed by Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois (who would go on to create
How to Train Your Dragon). It tells the story of Lilo (voiced by Daveigh Chase), a young Hawaiian girl living with her older sister, who adopts a pet she names Stitch (voiced by director Chris Sanders) who, it turns out, is actually an alien creature.
Lilo and Stitch is
, essentially a marriage of two plots, one of them heightened and over-the-top and the other relatable and down-to-earth. On the one hand there is Stitch's (known as experiment 262 on his planet) escape from an alien holding cell where he is being kept by the Galactic Federation as he is considered a dangerous and illegal genetic experiment. His creator, Dr. Jumba Jookiba (voiced by David Ogden Stiers) is sent to earth to retrieve him, along with the bumbling Agent Pleakley (voiced by Kevin McDonald), the Council's expert on Earth. On the other hand there is Lilo's relationship with her sister and guardian Nani (voiced by Tia Carrere). Nani struggles to provide and care for Lilo, who eccentricities often get her into trouble. When she loses her job at a local restaurant after an incident with Stitch, a social worker (voiced by Ving Rhames) threatens to take Lilo away if she can't find a new job. On paper this shouldn't work but somehow it does.
The relationship between Lilo and Nani is really well done and heartwarming. It's rare to see a sisterly relationship portrayed so well in a major motion picture. Everything Nani does is to help ensure that her and Lilo can stay together despite the fact that Lilo and Stitch keep thwarting her unintentionally. The film was made during an economic downturn in Hawaii and the story touches on this in Nani's struggle to get a job to support her and her orphaned sister. The film handles it weighty subject matter with real aplomb. There is a sense of pain and loss beneath the film's cheery demear but it is very subtle, working more as subtext then an explicit theme.
The antics with Stitch, Dr. Jumba and Agent Pleakley stand in direct contrast to this. Though I would argue that the film spends a little too much time with them, at their best, these scenes are filled to the brim with manic energy and hilarious slapstick and call to mind absurdist sci-fi comedies like
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and, especially,
Men in Black. At the same time Stitch's own story arc is weaved brilliantly into Nani and Lilo's. When he is first adopted by Lilo, Stitch is simply a monster trying to escape his creators. He delights in causing mayhem and destruction. Through the course of the film however he begins to form a real relationship with Lilo, and to yearn for something greater then what he was created for: a family. Similarly, just as Ving Rhames' Cobra Bubbles eventually realizes that Lilo and Nani belong together despite their flaws, so also the Galactic Council begins to see that Stitch is more then just a mad scientist experiment.
The voice actors all do a wonderful job with the material. Daveigh Chase, who was only eleven when this film was released, brings a lot of youthful energy to Lilo (In some ways the film is reminiscent of the
Peanuts shorts, which also featured child voice actors). Tia Carrere's portrayal of Nani is really endearing and sympathetic, she is the film's protagonist in many ways despite her name not being in the title. Chris Sanders brings a lot of manic energy to Stitch, as do David Ogden Stiers and Kevin McDonald as Jumba and Pleakley. Ving Rhames is perfectly cast as Cobra Bubbles, the former CIA agent turned social worker. Jason Scott Lee rounds out the cast David Kawena, Nani's supportive (and often neglected) boyfriend.
Lilo and Stitch has a really unique animation style. Because the film had a smaller budget than many of the studio's other output at the time, the pre-production team was relatively small,
and they were isolated from Disney's upper management until the film went into full
production. This allowed the filmmakers an unusual amount of freedom for a Disney feature. Director Chris Sanders's own personal artistic style was used for the characters and set design. He and co-director Dean DeBlois decided to use watercolor painted backgrounds for the film in lieu of the gouache technique which had been the standard for the studio since the late 40's. The result is a film that is more bright and colorful and much more distinctive looking then most of it's contemporaries.
Lilo and Stitch is one of the the most creative and genuinely moving films I've seen in a long time. Highly recommended!
Score: 9/10
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