Raya and the Last Dragon 4K 2021 Ultra HD 2160p

The action of the cartoon takes place in a world called Kumandra - an alternative version of the planet Earth. One of the representatives of the ancient civilization is a warrior named Raya, who sets out on a dangerous adventure to find the last dragon living in the world. Only then will it be possible to stop the long-term enmity that divided people.

Raya and the Last Dragon 4K Review
Long ago, dragons and people lived together in one state and did not know grief. Everything changed when they were attacked by Druuns - (almost) invincible monsters that turned any living creature to stone. The dragons became skilled, joined forces and sacrificed themselves, hiding the druuns in a magical (but, as the plot will show, extremely fragile) artifact and allowing people to return to their former life. The latter, however, did not learn to accept the gifts of fate, therefore, after the disappearance of their winged friends, they completely plunged into civil strife. The state split into mutually hating parts, and their inhabitants destroyed the dragon stone, from which the terrible druuns got out. Now Princess Raya - almost the only one who was lucky not to turn into a statue - must revive one of the main dragons and unite the state.

Even before the release of Raya, it was clear what laurels Disney would be resting on: rarely represented pan-Asian aesthetics (the kingdoms of Kumandra - a synthesis of Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand and other neighboring countries), spectacular fairy-tale landscapes justifying the appearance of cinema on large Russian screens, and, of course, some kind of peaceful passage in the finale, which should briskly reconcile everyone and everything. The forecast - quite predictably - came true exactly, there could be no other option. The new Disney cartoon, it seems, knocked out the audience's strike and doomed itself to the fate of a hit, that's just the triumph of "Frozen", also a picturesque feminist eco-tale (here, however, both feminism and "eco" are only tangentially), he does not threaten.

The question is not where the backdrops are more beautiful, the colors are brighter and the animation is more realistic. Let's say the variety of 50 shades of flora and fauna in "Paradise" is richer, and the technology is more modern - perhaps this idea is obvious, but the audience fell in love with not only (and not so much) all Disney tinsel, but, in fact, an innovative approach to history ... The form, yes, was important and - no one argues with this - it is quite revolutionary in the segment of the Hollywood mainstream, but it only competently framed the conflict of two sisters, two different temperaments, so believable and familiar to most of the public that the fabulous aesthetics only metaphorically supplemented and an already understandable plot.

Raya, on the other hand, focuses on visual elegance (however, even in this attempt she loses to the analogue film) and decides to be guided by ready-made studio templates. The heroine's sidekick is an awkward Knock-Knock, adorably touching, as if copied from the "Aladdin's" Abu (and if you don't have enough sugary animals and heroes who will be touched by children, you will get three monkeys and a child thief), her other partner is the dragon Sisu, despite Raya's expectations, she turns out to be not a mighty winged friend, but rather a Mulanian comedian-religion Wushu. And then everything is on the roll: the truths about trust, about unification, about forgiveness. In a word, about everything that is good, and about nothing that is bad. It is not the first time that Disney has exchanged truly impressive and complex stories about the difficulties of understanding loved ones (all the same "Frozen") or inequality in society ("Zootopia") for some kind of ideological consumer goods, but here the scale (several completely different territories with their eccentric inhabitants) seem to overshadow the apparent failure.

Although the same scale makes "Raya" completely unbearable. For a plot where fragments of a dragon stone act as a McGuffin, and the essence of the heroes' metaphysical quests comes down to collecting the artifact piece by piece and with each new step to understand that, in general, it is worth being more trusting of people, the timing of two hours is a test worse than what befell the protagonists. This cartoon, I think, is so confident in its gigantomania (more comic-religions, more sidekicks, more locations) that it wants to buy off only one of her. People may need to be trusted, but Disney once again proves that you need to keep your eye on it.

Info Blu-ray
Video
Codec: HEVC / H.265
Resolution: Upscaled 4K (2160p)
HDR: HDR10
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1

Audio
English: Dolby Atmos
English: Dolby TrueHD 7.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: Dolby Digital 5.1

Subtitles
English SDH, French, Japanese, Spanish.