Film

Moana

Disney reboots its own 2016 hit in live action, swapping hand-drawn ocean for photoreal CGI water and animatronic chickens. The songs, the wayfinding, the demigod tattoos, the giant crab — all present, all slightly heavier now that real light hits real (ish) faces. Dwayne Johnson returns as Maui; a new young lead carries Moana. Pleasant, familiar, aimed squarely at kids who loved the original and parents who'll happily watch it again.

TMDb rating7.3

If you liked this

Encanto2021

Same Disney engine — a girl, a magical inheritance, a family duty she didn't ask for — but sharper songs and a more interesting emotional knot at its centre. Lin-Manuel Miranda on excellent form.

But If you're Moana'd out on 'chosen girl saves her family's legacy' plots, this one runs the same shape again.

Encanto poster

The Little Mermaid2023no page yet

The exact same experiment — beloved animated Disney musical rebuilt in live action, water and all — so you can compare notes on whether the trick works twice.

But If the live-action Moana didn't fully land for you, this has the identical strengths and identical wobble.

Life of Pi2012

A genuinely awe-inducing ocean voyage, gorgeous and strange, about a young person alone with the sea and something enormous and dangerous for company. Ang Lee's visuals still hold up.

But It's meditative and often quiet where Moana is loud; younger kids may drift.

Life of Pi poster

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Kon-Tiki1950

Moana's whole plot rests on the idea that Polynesian wayfinding across the open ocean was real and astonishing. This is that claim, tested for real, decades before anyone animated a crab.

The Oscar-winning documentary of six men crossing 4,300 miles of open Pacific on a hand-built balsa raft to prove ancient Polynesians could have sailed it. Real ocean, real terror, real footage.

But Grainy 1950s film stock and voiceover narration — it asks for patience a Disney film never does.

Kon-Tiki poster
More like this (8)

Hercules1997

A cocky, self-mythologising demigod hero, gospel-choir musical numbers, and a genuinely funny script — basically Maui's spiritual older brother, if Maui had a Broadway agent.

But Looser and jokier than Moana, with less interest in the culture it's borrowing from.

Hercules poster

Aladdin1992

Another Disney animated-to-live-action remake with a charismatic non-human sidekick stealing scenes, for anyone curious how the studio's remake formula plays out elsewhere.

But Will Smith's Genie is a big, divisive swing — you'll know within ten minutes whether it's for you.

Aladdin poster

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl2003

Swashbuckling, cursed treasure, a sea that holds real menace, and a hero who's funnier than he has any right to be. The ocean-adventure template Moana borrows from freely.

But Longer, scarier, and aimed at teenagers rather than families with young kids.

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl poster

Brave2012

A headstrong girl defies her culture's expectations, gets tangled up with old magic, and has to fix what she's broken to save her mother. Same emotional spine, Scottish highlands instead of Pacific islands.

But The mother-daughter plot is the whole film — there's no big ocean spectacle to fall back on.

Brave poster

The Jungle Book2016no page yet

Disney's earlier live-action-plus-CGI remake experiment, and arguably the best of the bunch — a kid navigating a hostile, beautiful natural world guided by an unreliable companion.

But Genuinely tense in places for very young viewers; the tiger is not cuddly.

Kubo and the Two Strings2016

A mythic quest across a strange sea, ancestors who won't stay dead, and stop-motion animation so tactile you want to touch the screen. Quieter magic, same bones.

But Darker and sadder than Moana, with imagery that can properly spook younger children.

Kubo and the Two Strings poster

The Red Turtle2016

Same core image as Moana — the ocean as a character with will and memory, not just scenery — pushed to its quietest, most serious extreme, with animation as painterly as Moana's is polished.

A nearly wordless, hand-painted Studio Ghibli co-production about a man shipwrecked on an island where the sea itself seems to have intentions. Hypnotic, sparse, unlike anything Disney would risk making.

But No dialogue, no songs, no jokes — it's a mood piece, and a slow one at that.

The Red Turtle poster

Whale Rider2003

Moana softens its girl-chosen-by-the-sea story for a broad family audience; this tells essentially the same story from inside an actual Indigenous community, with all the friction Disney sands away.

A Maori girl believed by tradition to be unfit to lead her people insists otherwise, and the film backs her without a single musical number or CGI wave. Raw, unsentimental, quietly devastating.

But No spectacle, no comic sidekick — just a small community's real argument about gender, leadership and inheritance.

Whale Rider poster

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