Pixar have always been known for making films that work for adults as much as they work for children, with stories that can often times have themes and morals that are more impactful and important to grown-ups than they can be for children. That is a fantastic way to shape a movie for all ages, but you’ll find in that pendulum of demographics, teenagers are left out because being a teen isn’t the greatest feeling. Even ignoring the obvious hormonal issues that go through each individual teen’s body, movies and shows that are catered towards teens are arguably the easiest ones to mess up, not only because of media’s lack of proper handling of the teen demographic (often filling it with annoying cliches and forced love triangles that don’t feel authentic), but because most teen movies aren’t handling very well in general, it’s a difficult age range to capture without coming across as too phoney or too annoying. This is one of the aspects the latest Pixar film, Turing Red, is going to be faced with. Set in early 2000s Toronto, young Chinese Canadian girl, Meilin Lee (voiced by Rosalie Chiang) enjoys her straight-A student lifestyle and constantly living up to her mother Ming’s (voiced by Sandra Oh) standards, but this leaves her without her own identity and being unable to spend as much time with her girlfriends; Miriam, Abby and Priya (voiced by Ava Morse, Hyein Park and Maitreyi Ramakrishnan), especially gushing about their favorite boy-band, 4-Town. After it looks like she’ll remain comfortably ignorant under her mother’s loving yet strict hand, she suddenly wakes up one day to discover she’s become a large Red Panda. Learning that this is a family trait and that she can have it removed before the end of the month, Mei tries to survive with this new form that brings her a lot of stress and is only kept at bay through the love and support of her friends. But after discovering the Panda can be used to get a ticket to an upcoming 4-Town concert and with a more rebellious side coming out of the once rule-following Mei, will she want to have the Panda removed. The newest movie in Pixar’s line-up that was sent straight to Disney+, it received mixed reception from audiences, but has been mostly enjoyed by critics.

From the initial trailers to the concept alone, Turning Red is going to be a movie that won’t resonate with everyone. Usually, Pixar’s film line-up has delved into some pretty surreal and magical storylines, but this one centred around a regular teen girl in a regular human environment suddenly being turned into a giant Red Panda is not of the norm for them and maybe has the risk of coming across as too weird or too boring, feeling more like a Studio Ghibli idea than anything from Pixar. Thankfully, the movie actually manages to handle this aspect surprisingly strongly. The film understands to use a visual this striking on a deeper level and the movie manages to weave this transformation into the Chinese culture, which is strongly tied to this film, but also as a metaphor for going through puberty, and every strange, gross, and awkward experience that comes with it. Much like puberty, this transformation is big, dramatic, causes mood swings and makes you feel like you aren’t in your own body, but the movie actually takes it a step further. Mei wants to keep the Panda as it brings out a new more active side of her, one that seems to have been repressed by her mother and the rest of her family because it has the chance of causing panic and even harm to someone else. With how the movie ends, how it represents an all-encompassing part of life through a magical aspect, and even how it ties it with overbearing parenting and generational trauma, it manages to portray a done-before message in a very nice way. This is a first-time directing job for Domee Shi, who had previously created the Academy-Award winning Pixar short, Bao, and for a first-time outing, she does a really good job. Also helping to write this film along with Julia Cho, create the story along with Cho and Sarah Streicher, and taking personal inspiration from her own experiences growing up in Toronto, the film feels very driven by emotions and passion for the area, culture and the struggles and strange thrills of being a teen within the early 2000s (in which the film takes place). The movie does unfortunately lack a certain ‘’oomph’’ which most other Pixar films capture with their grander scope and message (even some of their bad films), whereas this film feels more like a ‘’coming-of-age teen film with a bizarre twist’’, this isn’t a bad thing, but it does hold it back from reaching similar heights.

The characters in a teen-based movie really need to be handled correctly if its going to work, because if real life teaches people anything, its that teenage can be incredibly insufferable to stomach, especially in a film based around that era. Thankfully, the movie manages to portray a lot of the feelings that go through most teenagers’ heads; the good, the bad, the rebellious, the stressed-out, the ‘’awakening’’ part of yourself, it portrays it in a very open and realistic manner, so none of the characters come of as tropes or as too annoying (at least not without intent behind it). The two leads, Mei, and her mother, Ming, are handled very well and are fortunately written to be much more than what their basic archetypes lay them out to be. Mei’s perfect schoolgirl track record and ‘’goody two shoes’’ nature is still matched with a side that is confidant, quirky and lovably awkward, the Panda doesn’t alter her personality, rather brings out better parts of the more expressive sides of her, and her wonderfully unique design mixed with Rosalie Chiang’s youthful, yet distinct voice adds a lot to the character. Her mother, Ming, is also much more than just a ‘’overbearing strict mother’’ as her genuine care and love for her daughter mixed with her own failures as a daughter and struggles with the Panda form give her much more layers than expected, and Sandra Oh’s performance brings a lot of dignity but also comedic energy to the role. Mei’s friends are all very distinct and likeable, with great designs and fantastic expressions, and they make for a really likeable friend group. Some roles go a little underdeveloped, particular Mei’s father and her grandmother, but no character feels like dead weight and the voice acting pulls everybody through. It’s also a movie that thankfully doesn’t force a true villain when one isn’t needed, instead relying on the characters emotions and the circumstances to further the drama and conflict, which is far more interesting and less cliched and expected.

Its weird to see a Pixar film where the PG rating does almost feel justified, not for anything visually graphic or emotionally distressing, but in its surprising honest about certain teen problems that come with that era (hearing stuff like taking drugs, thinking about ‘’sexy’’ things and worrying about periods in a Pixar movie is pretty bizarre, but welcoming). The animation for the movie has a really unique style and look to it; when some of it was originally shown off in the trailers, with its pastille color palette, enjoyably weird character designs that were filled with personality, and a focus more on softer tones and a more domestic environment which made them go flashier, crazier, and more surreal in the dynamic expressions and often intense close-ups and dream sequences. It actually finds a nice balance of being more realistic than other Pixar films in movement and lack of ‘sponge-and-stretch’ character physics, but still feature a similar wild and otherworldly feel in parts due to the Red Panda and some of the obvious anime influences. It’s great to see Pixar animation trying a new look to its CGI with a style that very clearly takes a lot of 2D influence in its simple designs but extreme expressions, it prevents things from getting stale and formulaic, and much like the previous Pixar film, Luca, it’s almost Aardman-animation look breaths a new genuine life into these characters. Toronto, though not focused on a lot, is made to feel like a very standard area that any regular kid could grow up in and it’s made to feel like it would for any kid who grew up in the early 2000s, something else that is very clearly placed into this movie. While that era is incredibly cynical and dated beyond belief, this movie doesn’t show-off most of the bad stuff and instead tackles the more enjoyably silly aspects like fashion styles, toys like Tamagotchi’s and even the obsession with boy bands (especially ones like Backstreet Boys and NSYNC). Even the music is very much inspired by that time period with popular sing Billie Eilish and her brother, Finneas O’Connell helping to write the songs for the film. It is a movie that wants to feel like it would have back in that era, which does come with its own faults. A movie based in the time period centred around a teen coming of age story is bound to push some people away as its just not a movie they would be that interested, and unfortunately the movie’s more teen-oriented focus, means it won’t work for certain ages groups like little kids and even some adults, it doesn’t have the same universal feel as other Pixar films.

The bottom line is that this movie is going to not appeal to everybody, it does try to be edgier and less straightforward than other Pixar movies, but in a manner that is more teen based than adult based. With that said, not being for everybody doesn’t mean this movie is a failure, if anything, standing out and succeeding in certain areas for what it is as oppose to what others want it to be feels incredibly fitting as that’s the entire message of this film. Its story is nicely told, its handling of the message is pretty good, the characters are memorable, the colors and animation are appealing, and it does do stuff a little more forward than a Pixar movie has ever really done, and shows things that young people, especially young girls, should see and react to. It is flawed and could have managed some of its cliches a little stronger, but for what this film is, it worked out much better than maybe it could have been received. The movie maybe could’ve benefited from a Miyazaki-type energy, where the mixture of real-life turmoil and magical attributes flowed much clearer, and the atmosphere a little less dated, but either way, this is a perfectly solid movie to show the older kids (maybe wait a few years for the little ones).

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