Moana (2016) *** 1/2 (out of 4)Beautiful looking and highly entertaining animated film from Disney tells the story of Moana, a young girl born on an island and who learns of various ocean tales from her grandmother. As a teen, Moana's island comes under a curse so she decides to set out to sea in order to find the Demigod and make things right. I had avoided watching this, although my two-year-old daughter seems to watch it a couple dozen times a day. I finally sat down and watched it with her and it's certainly another winner for Dinsey. There are a lot of great things about this picture but what I enjoyed most was the actual look of the film.I thought the visual quality was amazing and it really does seem as if the company keeps getting better with each new film. I really loved the vivid colors as they really jump off the screen with their beauty. The majority of the film takes place at sea and I really loved the colorful look of the ocean. The scenes on the various islands are also great to look at.The film also works perfectly as an adventure and that's made even better because the Moana character is so much fun. Being able to go on the adventure with her was a lot of fun and I thought the various battles she has to face were a lot of fun. The Lava Monster was brilliantly designed and certainly made for more fun. Then you've got the Maui character voiced by Dwayne Johnson. Both MOana and Maui add up to one of the more entertaining Disney duos in recent years. The vocal performances are all extremely good and for the most part all of the characters are great. The one exception would be the "dumb chicken" who I just didn't find to be entertaining or at least not up to the level of everyone else. Tee song and music numbers are all catchy and quite good as well. Throw in some nice laughs and MOANA really is another winner for the company.

Usual Disney princess movie formula describes this movie: Step 1. Chose a theme and setting, Step 2. Start movie with Disney castle, netx add some conflict backstory, then go to characters child where they find something relating to the conflict, skip to the current age character with musical town intro, kill family member(s), character starts adventure with singing and leaves home. Step 3. Make middle part with more singing and adding characters (good and bad) (also esablish main threat) while main character goes to some places. Step 4. Add a sad or losing part for the main character. Step 5. Final sequence or fight where main character discovers something and then wins, then make final scenes where everything is better again, cut to credits.If you think you have seven this formula before in Disney movies you will know what to expect for this one. The theme is Pacific Islander this time. That is all that is different in this movie. Overall average

This was possibly the best Disney movie I've seen this year. The songs are wonderful, the animation fresh, spectacular and not overblown. Everything sparkles with originality. The cast is, well, perfectly cast. If you enjoyed The Croods then this is the next step up. Hugely enjoyable.

Nothing to say other than excellent...my favourite Disney film to date and I'm an avid Disney film watcher and lover...along with my husband and 19 month old son and he would quite happily watch moana back to back all day if we let him! Beautiful film with excellent music...a must watch.