Kung-Fu Panda has seen too many kung-fu movies, so many that it feels authentic to a certain degree. And yet, it’s a cartoon, essentially the least authentic kind of picture the cinema is capable of releasing. It inversely mirrors something that’s been going on in kung-fu movies since Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon — movie kung-fu has gradually been drifting into cartoon territory. Think about it: warriors fighting on treetops, skipping across glassy pools of water, levitating into sword fights, walking up walls and onto ceilings … you know, Wile E. Coyote physics. So it makes sense then that kung-fu finally admitted its intentions with this computer-animated kung-fu movie.
And what a delightful, energetic movie it is. It opens on panda Po (voiced dexterously by Jack Black), a dreamer who desires only one thing — to become a kung-fu master. But his father, a duck (!!!), has already staked out Po’s career: he will make noodles, not knuckle sandwiches. But then a threat settles upon the quaint little valley and the local kung-fu master must choose the heir to the Dragon Scroll, a text that apparently contains the greatest kung-fu secrets imaginable. Guess who’s selected? Of course Po, who’s so out of shape he almost misses the ceremony because he can’t drag his paunch up a never-ending flight of stairs.
This sets up the rest of the movie: Po must learn enough kung-fu to defend the valley from an unstoppable enemy, a tiger that has escaped from a fortress prison guarded by a legion of rhinos. But before Po ever flexes his overly developed tummy muscles — this panda be fat — he has to win the approval of Master Shifu, a squirrel with a beard, and his five students, one of which is a kung-fu mantis. How mantis actually performs kung-fu is never really answered in the film, but this film's an equal opportunity kung-fu employer. All in all, it’s not the most original plot, in fact it might be from an unfilmed Akira Kurosawa picture (minus the animals, of course), but it works because it’s fun, invigorating even.
For once I can’t complain about the voice acting. When we see the actor talking instead of the character, then the movie has failed because the illusion is broken. Early in Panda I stopped seeing Jack Black, a hefty comedy force with a distinctive voice, and instead saw a talking panda. I didn’t even realize Angelina Jolie voiced a tigress until the credits. That speaks well for the film, which obviously paid more attention to its characters than its voice talent. Not to say Black doesn’t inject his rubbery brand of humor into Po — he does — it’s just that it feels natural for the character, who at one point hits every faux pas in his village including eating from the Tree of Infinite Wisdom and washing his pits in the Pool of Eternal Tears. 
Kung-Fu Panda becomes something special when it begins swinging its fists. Characters engage in martial-arts combat so fluidly, and with such engaging and inventive detail, that it feels too good to be just animation, as if kung-fu expert Yuen Wo-Ping (The Matrix) were choreographing flips, twists and lunges within every line of computer code. A sequence on a wooden bridge, where five warriors attempt to stop the marauding tiger high above a valley, stands out. As five heroes make logical and plausible attacks, the tiger defends itself using the environment to its advantage. I watched in awe at how fast the animation moved, how agile the characters’ movements were and how intense a sequence could be without a single line of dialogue. 
Later, Po, who has now learned kung-fu from a single dumpling, fights the tiger in a remarkable scene that utilizes the entire valley and ends with the Black-coined word: “Skidoosh!” The action uses a number of slow-motion effects that create effective silent comedy bits. The pudgy little panda, with his stumpy elephant-like feet, is so out of his element it was hilarious. Kung-Fu Panda, with its lush environments and devastating gravity-defying offense, has married beauty to muscle — the end result is electrifying. But make no mistake, this is a children’s film. It may not have as much adult appeal as one of the big Pixar movies, but it will entertain the adults almost as much as the children they’re taking to it.
And someone define “skidoosh” for me, please.
***This review originally ran in the West Valley View June 6, 2008.***
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