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With a score by Jerry Goldsmith and five original songs with the music and lyrics by Matthew Wilder and David Zippel (Hercules), respectively, the trio never creates anything particularly memorable. Goldsmith is the highlight among the three for some thematic chords, but doesn’t incorporate much of the Chinese culture into his music like the film’s animators do in terms of design.

Animated in a variety of brushstrokes, Mulan is impressively assembled, incorporating a mix of Americanized animation with strong ties to the Chinese culture. While not exactly a history lesson, Mulan is rich to look at, having its images surpass the story at points in terms of attention and quality.

Ming-Na (ER) is superb as the voice of Mulan, filled with emotion and a great vocal range, managing to be manly in a cartoon-y, animated way. Eddie Murphy also lends his voice as the tiny fire-breathing dragon, Mushu, set out to protect Mulan. While Murphy’s Donkey from Shrek is the highlight of his voice work career, Mushu was another fun opportunity for Murphy to stretch out his vocal muscles. Mushu also played an important role in Eddie’s image makeover that started only a year or two prior of Mulan’s release, where he began to aim for the family market that resulted in some of the best box office results of his career.

Speaking of box office, Mulan did an okay job, surpassing the totals of The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Hercules (the two previous animated June releases from Disney – although steep falls from Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King). Opening at $22.7 million, Mulan had strong legs, although nothing atypical compared to Disney’s other family releases, and wrapped up with $120.6 million ($200.4 million adjusted). Murphy’s Dr. Dolittle was released one week later and wound up with $144 million. Mulan added $180.6 million in foreign coin to the pot, again, in line with the other Disney releases. Made for $90 million, when you throw in the toy sales and Disney theme park spin-off revenue, Mulan was a moneymaking success. Most importantly, Mulan proved that female-led animated films had an audience. After the one-two flops of Anastasia ($58.4 million over Thanksgiving of 1997) and Quest for Camelot ($22.5 million, released one month before Mulan), women characters were in jeopardy when it came to animation. Mulan showed that with the right material, people would come.

With an 86% rating on Rottentomatoes.com (a lower 71% among Top Critics), Mulan was a hit amongst the critics, although the kudos for most of them were much more muted compared to other Disney animated releases. It got only one Oscar nomination for “Best Music, Original Musical or Comedy Score.” Keep in mind, though, that this was before the creation of the “Best Animated Picture” category.

A technical achievement with mid-tier writing, Mulan is a solid entry in the Disney animated wheelhouse. As the Disney-owned Pixar is about to give another rebel female the chance to hold the bow-and-arrow, let’s just hope that Brave will be able to hit the bull’s eye that Mulan just misses.

Verdict: With Us
7 out of 10

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