Aloha. Pehea 'oe? ʻO SJ koʻu inoa. Ke ho'āʻo nei au i kahi mea hou. E hewa paha kēia unuhi. E lokomaikaʻi ināʻo ia. ʻAʻole wau i māmā ma ka'ōlelo Hawaiʻi. Pono wau e hilinaʻi i Google Translate no kēia. Makemake wau e aʻo i kekahi lā Hawaiʻi. He'ōlelo Hawaiʻi ka Duolingo. Nui nā hua'ōlelo, mau hōʻailona, a me nā hua'ōlelo. Ua hauʻoli wau ua kākauʻia kēia. Eʻoluʻolu e nonoi mai iaʻu e haʻi i kekahi o kēia. E pau wau. He lōʻihi nā hua'ōlelo. ʻO kēia ke kiʻiʻoniʻoni, Lilo and Stitch.
Switching to English now, because there’s no way I’m doing an entire review in Hawaiian, our movie opens up on a distant planet, where a mad alien scientist is on trial for illegal experimentation. He is found guilty, and his experiment-a monster designed to destroy everything he touches-is sent away to be exiled. Experiment 626 escapes captivity and crashes on Earth, specifically the Hawaiian island of Kauai. Since they can’t destroy the Earth because they believe mosquitoes are an endangered species (no really), Jumba is sent to retrieve 626 with the help of resident Earth expert, Agent Pleakley.
On Kauai, Lilo is late to her hula class because she was feeding a specific fish. The other girls in her dance class avoid her and call her weird. After getting in a fight, she is sent home. Her older sister, Nani, comes to get her, but Lilo beats her home and locks her out of the house. This is extremely bad timing, since a social worker arrives just then to assess Nani’s abilities as Lilo’s guardian. He gives her three days to improve her living conditions, or Lilo will be taken away. Nani overhears Lilo praying for a friend, so she decides to get Lilo a dog.
Meanwhile, 626 has a rude welcoming to Earth when he is almost immediately run over by two semi-trucks. He is mistaken for a dog and sent to the shelter. Jumba and Pleakley are on his trail, and he knows it. He decides to disguise himself as a dog and Lilo picks him out. With a human shield, 626, now known as Stitch, is able to wander around freely. This enrages Jumba, since he can’t harm any humans. Jumba and Pleakley disguise themselves as humans to try and capture Stitch at the luau place where Nani works. They fail, and their stunt gets Nani fired.
Stitch quickly runs out of things to destroy in the home, so Lilo introduces him to Elvis music and uses Elvis as a model citizen and tries to train Stitch to follow his example while Nani looks for a new job before Cobra Bubbles' deadline. Unfortunately, Lilo and Stitch’s antics prevent Nani from being hired anywhere. David comes by and takes them both surfing to cheer them up. Stitch is curious about how the three humans have fun in the ocean. By the end of the day, he willingly goes surfing with Nani and Lilo. However, this is when Jumba and Pleakley decide to make their move and capture Stitch. Stitch manages to escape, but he drags Lilo down under the water with him. Agent Bubbles sees the whole thing and says he must take Lilo away the next day.
At home, Nani talks things over with Lilo, and Stitch leaves since he feels like he doesn’t fit in and it is his fault Lilo is being taken away. Jumba and Pleakley are fired and Gantu is put on the job. Jumba takes the opportunity to capture Stitch “his way,” outside the rules of the Galactic Council. He tracks Stitch down in the woods and dashes his hopes of ever finding a family. Stitch runs back to the house, where he and Jumba accidentally destroy it. Bubbles attempts to take Lilo away, but she runs away from him. Stitch finds her and reveals his true form to her.
Gantu arrives on Earth and quickly catches the pair. Stitch manages to escape, but Lilo does not. Jumba and Pleakley nab the distracted experiment. Nani confronts them and demands that they bring Lilo back home. They resist, but Stitch convinces them to rescue the girl. They chase Gantu in their ship across Hawaii and manage to rescue Lilo and Gantu when his ship blows up. They crash in the ocean and David gives them all lifts back to shore.
Once on shore, the Grant Councilwoman captures Stitch and prepares to take him away, but not before firing Gantu. Lilo points out that she bought Stitch from the shelter and it would be stealing if the aliens took him. The Grand Councilwoman sentences Stitch to life in exile on Earth. Jumba and Pleakley are left behind and move in with Lilo and Nani.
Lilo Pelekai, voiced by Daveigh Chase, is a lonely girl living on Kauai who is five or six years old. She lives with her older sister, Nani. She has a ritual where she feeds a fish a peanut butter sandwich, and she believes that this fish controls the weather. Most likely, she made this connection after she didn’t feed the fish, and her parents died in a car accident shortly after on a rainy night. She loves to listen to Elvis Presley music and even uses Elvis as a model citizen when she teaches Stitch how to behave. One of her hobbies is taking pictures of fat tourists. I do not know why she does it, I do not know if it is ever explained in any of the other movies or the show, it is just something she does.
Stitch aka Experiment 626, voiced by Christopher Michael Sanders, is a genetic experiment created by Jumba. He has six limbs, spines, and antennae, but he can hide two arms, the spines, and antennae and disguise himself as a dog. Why people think the blue thing in front of them is a dog is unknown. He was programmed to destroy, but when put in an environment where that is simply not possible, he was forced to find another purpose in life. He initially uses Lilo as a get out of jail free card, since he knows Jumba and Pleakley were bound by Galatic Federation regulations, which states that humans cannot be harmed. He quickly bonded with the girl and even lead a rescue mission after Gantu captured her.
Nani Pelekai, voiced by Tia Carrere, is Lilo’s nineteen-year-old sister and legal guardian. She fights for her sister and does everything she can to give Lilo a happy childhood. When she overheard Lilo praying for a friend, she decided to adopt a dog from the shelter so Lilo would have someone to play with. She worked as a waitress at a tourist trap until she was fired because Stitch attacked a disguised Pleakley. David has a crush on her, and if she did not have to worry about Lilo, then she would most likely start dating him. However, the two are content to be friends for the time being.
Dr. Jumba Jookiba and Agent Pleakley, voiced by David Ogden Stiers and Kevin McDonald respectively, are in charge of tracking down Stitch on Earth. Jumba is a scientist who was convicted of illegal genetic experimentation, and Pleakley is an expert on Earth in the Galatic Federation. Pleakley is told to go in order to make sure Jumba does not break Federation rules. In order to blend in, they don wigs and human clothes and pretend to be a married couple. The disguises, as horrible as they are, seem to work. No one notices the extra eyes on Jumba and lack of two eyes and the extra leg on Pleakley. Honestly, it’s amazing that all the aliens speak perfect English. You will occasionally hear other alien languages, mostly from Stitch, but it seems that English is the primary language spoken by every single alien in the galaxy.
Captain Gantu, voiced by Kevin Michael Richardson, is a large alien that sort of resembles a shark or a whale. Kind of. Gantu is the type to shoot first and ask questions later. He is portrayed as the villain of the movie, but honestly, he was just trying to do his job. He was in charge of transporting Stitch to a deserted asteroid where he would be banished, until Stitch escaped. After Jumba and Pleakley proved incompetent, Gantu was put in charge of catching Stitch, which he did with ease. Until Stitch escaped. Again. Jumba is the convicted criminal, and Gantu was the one put in charge of cleaning up his mess. He was fired because he went outside of Galactic Federation regulations and endangered humans during the chase scene. I wouldn’t call him the villain so much as a guy who takes his job too seriously.
Agent Cobra Bubbles, voiced by Ving Rhames, is a former CIA agent turned social worker. In 1973, he was involved with something at Roswell. He had hair in 1973. He also convinced some aliens not to destroy the Earth by telling them that mosquitoes were an endangered species and humans were their primary source of food. There is a popular theory that Lilo and Nani’s parents were CIA with him and that’s why he looks after them, but I do not think that is true. This theory I think is more accurate. Another explanation, I believe, is that he had a horrible boss and grew to hate his job at the CIA and decided to change careers. He describes his social worker job as, “I am the one they call when things go wrong, and things have indeed gone wrong.” I took this to mean he is in a supervisory position and he makes the final call before any child has to be taken away from their home.
There are only three songs worth mentioning. The first is “He Mele No Lilo.” It is a beautiful song sung in the Hawaiian language. I wish I could sing along to it, but so far I have been unable to accurately sing the Hawaiian words. According to this, the title translates to “A Song for Lilo.” The page also has an English translation of the lyrics. I also found a video with the English translation of the lyrics. Then there is “Hawaiian Roller Coaster Ride.” This is my favorite song. I have been trying to learn how to sing the Hawaiian parts accurately without the lyrics in front of me. I still need some work. I did find a translation of the lyrics. The last song is “Aloha Oe.” It’s short and sweet and a song that was written by Queen Lili’uokalani. The queen reportedly wrote the song after saying goodbye to Colonel James Harbottle Boyd, and Nani sang it the night before Lilo was to be taken away. Every other song is an Elvis song, and those aren’t worth talking about.
The animation is unique. All of the backgrounds were done with watercolors, which gives the movie a certain charm. This does mean that some little details, like footprints in the sand, are missing, but that’s just a nitpick. The characters were animated well. I really like Nani’s design. Most fully grown women are usually drawn as sticks and/or have huge boobs. Nani is fit, but she has more realistic curves than most other animated women, especially those drawn before the turn of the century.
As you know, Disney’s latest craze has been remaking classic animated movies into live-action movies. Supposedly, Lilo and Stitch is set to get this treatment. This has been floating around the internet for a while now, but I could not find any concept art, any tentative release date, or really anything hardcore except for who is supposed to write it. If/when they plan to release a live-action version, I have no idea how it will work. Obviously the aliens will be CG, and even though CG has come a long way since it was first introduced, it does not always look the best. This guy did a decent job of explaining when CG can be useful and will look amazing, versus when it will look obviously fake. I do agree with him when he says that CG looks best when mixed with practical effects. So, if/when a live-action version comes out, I hope they are able to make the aliens look realistic. But I find that most of the Disney live-action remakes are pretty hit or miss, and they are almost never as good as the original, especially when they are retelling a story rather than expanding the story. A live action version of Lilo and Stitch would almost have to be a straight retelling, and I don’t know if that will make for a good movie.
‘O ko’u inoa’o SJ a’o kēia ko’u mau mana’o maoli ma luna o Lilo and Stitch. Aloha.