Moana

When I started a new file on MS Word to write this review, my laptop helpfully pointed out, “Moana already exists.” (I’d previously reviewed the 2016 version.) And that’s the inherent problem with these live-action Disney cash-grabs, which combine the worst of front-office risk aversion with audience déjà vu. Why do these animated classics need to be redone with flesh-and-blood performers? Is the implication that cartoons are somehow less-than? Why isn’t the studio churning out animated remakes of live-action hits like The Parent Trap or The Santa Clause?

These philosophical questions come up with each new remake, and the best that can be said for Moana 2026 is that, for a movie that doesn’t particularly need to exist in the first place, it at least succeeds as entertainment. The instant-classic songs from Lin-Manuel Miranda help, aided by Dwayne Johnson and Jemaine Clement reprising their roles from the original in a manner suited to their non-cartoon surroundings.

The real reason to see Moana, outside of familiarity, is for newcomer Catherine Laga’aia in the title role and for veteran Maori actor Rena Owen (Once Were Warriors, Sirens) as the heroine’s wise and loving Gramma Tala. (Full disclosure: I’ve had the privilege of knowing Owen for decades.) The ingenue and the screen legend create the film’s most moving moments, and Laga’aia sells the rest of it, from her “Where I’ll Go” dreams to acting as straight-man to Johnson’s hammy, egotistical demigod.

You know the story: Moana is next in line to be chief of her idyllic South Pacific village, but when the coconuts rot and the fish disappear, Gramma Tala tells her she must resume her people’s abandoned seafaring ways and go on a quest. If Moana can find shape-shifting trickster Maui (Johnson) and return the heart of Te Fiti, the mother of all islands, then balance will be restored.

Director Thomas Kail comes to the project with unassailable musical bona fides, having directed Miranda’s Hamilton and In the Heights onstage, as well as the video capture of Hamilton (along with episodes of Fosse/Verdon). But a live-action movie that involves a gesticulating ocean, a comedy-relief rooster, and a jewel-obsessed giant crab demands more VFX than this relative novice can apparently handle. The effects are a supremely mixed bag — Heihei, the afore-mentioned fowl, doesn’t have to look realistic, so his cartoonishness doesn’t assault the eye. But the character design on Tamatoa the crab (Clement) is a jarringly ugly miscalculation, and when Maui assumes bird form, it appears that the animators got stuck in an uncanny valley between a real animal and one that’s supposed to let viewers know that it’s really Dwayne Johnson behind that beak.

To its credit, this Moana is less than 10 minutes longer than the original, so it’s not plagued with the padding of the disastrous Snow White. The performers sell the heartfelt emotion and witty wordplay of the songs, although Miranda’s new composition, “Along the Way,” gets dumped into the closing credits, and deservedly so. Editor Melanie Oliver (Matilda: The Musical, Cats) keeps the forward momentum as bright as the lushly tropical cinematography from Oscar Faura (Young Woman and the Sea). Mark Mancina once again provides the score, and its use of Pacific Island–inflected choral vocals gives the finale its necessary intensity.

As the meme (and your mom) would say, you already have Moana at home. This version, for whatever it’s worth, at least ranks among the best of this crop — even if, like me, you wish Disney would stop harvesting it.

Director: Thomas Kail
Screenwriter: Jared Bush & Dana Ledoux Miller, based on the original screenplay by Jared Bush
Cast: Dwayne Johnson, Rena Owen, John Tui, Frankie Adams, Jemaine Clement, Catherine Laga?aia
Executive producers: Scott Sheldon, Charles Newirth, Thomas Kail, Auli?i Cravalho
Producers: Dwayne Johnson, Beau Flynn, Dany Garcia, Hiram Garcia, Lin-Manuel Miranda
Director of photography: Oscar Faura
Production design: John Myhre
Editing: Melanie Ann Oliver
Music: Mark Mancina
Sound design: Tim Nielsen, re-recording mixer/sound designer/supervising sound editor
Production companies: Walt Disney Pictures
In English
115 minutes