Togo is Disney’s Best Film of 2019
After a series of hackneyed remakes and incessant sequels that kill the heart & soul of what Disney is all about, their streaming service, Disney+, receives the best Christmas film they can have: a genuinely good movie with fantastic performances and a mature heart. I remember “back in the days” where Disney movies where more than “re-doing our old movies and not trying to improve on the original and doing the exact same thing but in live action, 95% of the time”, and actively made the child reflect about the world revolving around him. The prime example of that is Disney’s vicious attemps at not glossing over character deaths, and make the children realize that life isn’t permanent. In Bambi, the most shocking sequence is when the titular character has to realize that he will never see his mother again, since she got killed. Togo harkens back to Disney’s golden days, a movie that isn’t afraid to be mature with its audience and showcases a true story without hiding anything back, like most family movies do.
The film tells the story of how Leonhard Seppala (Willem Dafoe) and his dog Togo played a key role in the Serum Run of 1925, as they try to bring medicine to Nome, Alaska during a Diphteria outbreak. Already, the tone of the film is quite grim, as many children are dying of Diphteria. We don’t see the children suffering, but the signs on many of the town’s buildings “Diphteria. Keep Out” and the townspeople talking about how bad the outbreak has become makes it incredibly heartbreaking, but respectable enough for children to be able to watch it. The film’s color palette and cinematography is quite dark and bleak, which complements its setting. Already, I knew that the movie was going to be good, because it felt like Disney is finally doing something different than remaking their entire catalogue and making movies exclusively destined for children. Director (and cinematographer) Ericson Core (who directed one of 2015’s biggest duds, Point Break) understands how the subject matter should be handled for families, knowing what to show and what to tell. It’s his best effort yet, even if the cinematography is highly bizarre at times. The handheld shots are very dynamic, but also weirdly composed. I can’t really describe it, it’s best to be seen to know what I mean. For example, when the camera follows Togo as a young puppy, it likes to move like a dog runs. It’s unnecessary fluff that adds absolutely no artistic value.
With a 40 million dollar budget, you can tell it wasn’t enough to finish Togo’s terrible-looking CGI. Even with the standards of a direct-to-consumer content, I expect better when dealing with sequences that are supposed to be the film’s best. The “money-shot” moments Ericson Core wants you to say “wow” to is when Seppala and Togo cross the Norton Sound. The CGI of that sequence feels incredibly unfinished that I’d be ashamed to have worked on the film’s effects if I was a part of the project. Nothing in those particular sequences feel believable, even if Core tries so hard at making you believe that the action sequence is exciting. It’s not. You can actually see how badly rendered the CGI is when the ice cracks, none of it feels natural and/or flows within the next “ice crack”. For reference, see Anthony C. Ferrante’s Sharknado films. The CGI in Togo is on par with Sharknado, and that’s bad. You at least want it to look convincing so it won’t make your audience come out of what is an enjoyable film.
Togo follows the same structure as Tom Harper’s dud The Aeronauts, telling the story of the Serum Run in a non-linear way. The only difference between Togo and The Aeronauts is that the flashbacks actually helps developing the character of Leonhard Seppala and deepening his relationship with his wife, Constance (Julianne Nicholson), and Togo. Willem Dafoe commends the screen as Seppala, stealing every inch of the frame he has during his sequences. Every scene that involves him bonding with Togo is highly interesting to watch, and isn’t done in a “cookie-cutter” clichéd relationship like many dog films, particularly in a previous Disney film that came out this year: The Art of Racing in the Rain. At first, Seppala doesn’t like Togo, he even calls him “Satan”. But when he realizes that Togo is a lead dog in a sled, he develops a fond affinity with him that will stay until the day he dies. Most of the film has fantastic dialogue scenes that are surprisingly mature — and thoughtful. Scenes in which the Bible is reminisced and even cited is something I never thought I would see in modern-day Disney in which most of their movies are terribly secularized and pander to everyone and everything. The humor in Togo makes the film have a lighter touch, but its grim setting and serious action setpieces overshadows everything else.
Above all else, Togo presents a humane story between a dog and his master that is both mature and heartfelt. The film doesn’t shy away from the mature subject matter of a Diphteria Outbreak, and that’s what makes it so fresh, because there hasn’t been a single Disney film (from Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures) that dared touch mature subject matters for children. I also love how the film exposes Togo’s injustice, due to the fact that Gunnar Kaasen (Shaun Benson) is the one that arrived in Nome with the Medicine and, because of that, the dog Balto was made the hero. Ericson Core’s Togo exposes the true story of 1925’s serum run, and the injustice Seppala and his dog received after completing the most miles and playing the most pivotal role in the run. It’s been a while since I’ve seen a Disney movie actually take risks in its storytelling and broadens its appeal to a family, rather than small children to OBEY and CONSUME like the dull Frozen II and the slew of bad remakes the studio has given us this year. Will Disney make a resurgence with their new streaming service? Only time will tell, but I sure want more movies like Togo.
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