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Smallfoot Teaches Audiences to Question Everything
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Submitted by RJ Carter on Fri, 01/11/2019 - 19:25
Migo (CHANNING TATUM) is a yeti, who lives in an advanced society of yetis on the top of a mountain. And Migo knows the laws: that the mountaintop was pooped out of a giant bird, that it rests on the back of giant animals, that the gong must be rung every morning to wake up the giant burning snail so it crawls across the sky.
These laws are written in stone -- literally -- and taught to all by the Stonekeeper (COMMON). And among those stones is the law: There is no such thing as a Smallfoot.
But as Migo trains with his father, Dorgle (DANNY DEVITO), to be the next ringer of the gong, he overshoots his target (the only way to ring the gong is to be slingshotted into it, head first) and ends up outside the city. There he spies a small aircraft crashing, and inside of it -- a Smallfoot! Or, as we would say, a human.
When nobody believes Migo saw what he saw, Migo is exiled from the city to think about what he's saying, and ends up falling off the mountain.
Enter Percy (JAMES CORDEN), a nature videographer who wants to fake a film about yetis in order to pull in big ratings. But when he meets Migo, Migo decides to take him back up the mountain to prove he was telling the truth, whether Percy wants to go or not.
Although Migo is vindicated, this does not sit well with the Stonekeeper, whose daughter Meechee (ZENDAYA) is ready to rethink all the stones as she engages in advanced research with Percy about what he is and how he must live. Taking Migo into his confidence, the Stonekeeper reveals the truth to Migo -- that they've always known about the humans, and that every seemingly stupid activity performed in their daily society is one of many cogs in a wheel that power a hidden machine, designed to keep the cloud cover around the mountain so that the lower world is kept from view. The Stonekeeper knows that yetis and humans used to live side by side -- until humans nearly drove them into extinction. (The rap song Common uses to deliver this information is quite fun, by the way.)
Faced with the truth -- that interaction with humans may result in the death of his friends -- Migo has to figure out how to convince everyone that he was lying, when they've already seen the evidence with their own eyes.
SMALLFOOT is a fable about questioning established truths, whether it's an article of faith or settled science. Meechee's character is definitely a role model for the advancement of STEM studies, and the choices made in the film force everyone to question everything, especially those who lie with the best of intentions. Definitely one that the family will enjoy, especially if you have kids who already have a fascination with sasquatch legends.
Grade:
4.0 / 5.0
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