Khumba the Flying Zebra (plus an explanation regarding my disappearance)

 So, it has been a time since my last blog post. Over a year to be exact. I'd like to give an apology to anyone who was following this blog up to that point. I am hoping to post on a semi-regular basis again though, so hopefully, you'll hear more from me in the near future. Before I touch on my newest movie, Khumba the Flying Zebra, I'd like to explain why I went on hiatus.

Hiatus:

I'm going to keep this section relatively brief as I don't want to distract it from the main attraction, so to summarize, it was a combination of both a loss of interest and me not really having anything interesting to talk about. Oh sure, I could go on and on about how I came up with certain movie concepts, but there are two issues with that.

1. I have a terrible memory. I tend to forget a lot of things easily unless I write them down and writing down exactly how I got certain ideas doesn't sound like a fun prospect. Not to me, at least.

2. Even if I were to remember, they're not particularly exciting. Most of my ideas just come up spontaneously. If they're lucky, they'll be worked on relatively soon after I come up with them. More often than not, however, they sit on my Google Drive while I think about how exactly I'd go about it. Maybe I'll work on them, maybe I won't. The point is, they're stuck in a weird limbo. It's not particularly exciting.

I do have a few really fun behind-the-scenes stories regarding how certain movies came to be, but those are all subjects for another day.

The second big reason is a general loss of interest, especially after The Youngest Hart fiasco. You know the one, the time I hyped this movie as my best ever, it didn't perform anywhere near my irrationally high expectations and I had a meltdown over it. That one. After that incident, I felt like it wasn't worth airing all my stuff out on a personal blog when really, I can just keep my head down and work on making movies. It sucks but ultimately, I felt that was better than plugging movies that may or may not perform well.

With that said, I have on occasion considered a return to blogging, mainly because it's a fun way to communicate with everyone here and it's a good way to build up publicity for future releases. It's also the place where I can get on my soapbox and ramble about how to write movies (as well as how not to).

That's the past now, this is today. I'm very excited to be writing for this blog again and I'm very curious to see how things go this time around. With that being said, let's talk about Khumba the Flying Zebra!

Khumba the Flying Zebra:

(As always, a shoutout to the admin for the wonderful film poster he's provided!)

Khumba the Flying Zebra got its start on the LRF ideas thread a while back. I wanted to do another animal-based animated movie with Oh Deer being a success. With that in mind, the next logical step was to do a movie in the heart of Africa, focusing on an animal that doesn't get much attention, the zebra. Yes, we do have Madagascar's Marty, but other than that, there aren't many movies that involve a zebra as the main character. Then it hit me. Zebras are related to horses who in turn evolved from the pegasus, so I thought that it would be really interesting if the main character of this movie (Khumba) were in some way, shape, or form related to pegasi, giving him the ability to fly?

Now, this idea does run into a few issues. If the zebra is related to a pegasus, how did that happen? How far does the family tree extend and how exactly does it all tie together? In the movie, you'll notice I gave the explanation of Khumba being a genetically advanced zebra. It's not much, but it's the best way I could come up with in regards to explaining this feature without it overtaking the movie. If I were to write a sequel to this movie, I would delve further into Khumba's status and how this came to be.

This then leads us to our main character and the cast in general. For Khumba, I wanted someone young but also composed. A mature, disciplined leader who still has much to learn. With that in mind, I brought in Jon Boyega to fill the role. He impressed me after his turn as The Crow when we last worked together and I felt he would be a good fit to play the benevolent, wise leader of the herd. As a counterpart, I brought in Kevin Hart to play Khumba's rival, Mahki. Whereas Khumba is firm, pragmatic, and soft-spoken, Mahki is disrespectful, militant and overly aggressive. When he wants something, he'll do anything to get it. This, unsurprisingly supplies a great amount of the movie's conflict as Mahki eventually leaves the herd to form his own.

There are also other characters. Long-time collaborator and friend Anna Kendrick plays Khumba's supportive tree-monkey friend Tiki, Gael-Garcia Bennett is the wise hornbill named Coco (congrats if you got the reference by the way), Vanessa Hudgens and Dusan Brown are the wife and child of Khumba respectively and Joe A'noai (better known to wrestling fans as Roman Reigns) is the resident falcon. Each actor plays a character that best fits them as a person while also lets them show off some of their acting chops.

Soundtrack:

The next thing to talk about is the soundtrack. Given this is a film set in Africa, I felt it made sense for the movie to have a mostly African-based soundtrack, though there are few exceptions. To explain their inclusion, we're going to go over all the songs in the soundtrack and detail their place in the film.

1.  African Safari by Derek Fiechter (This is the song you hear as the movie begins and our narrator, John DeLancie describes Tanzania, Africa. It's an authentic, jovial piece that illustrates the home of each creature that lives in the nation and is a good opening piece before all that happens.)

2. Ukuthula by Cape Town Youth Choir (I imagine this song taking place as Tiki and Khumba are resting by a rock. This is a beautiful, soothing choir piece that prays for peace upon this beautiful planet we call Earth and serves as an excellent piece to represent the discussion of the stars the two friends have. On a personal note, I sang this song every year during choir for our spring concert. It was our way of sending the seniors off after all they've contributed to the program. As such, I felt it'd be a nice way to pay tribute to those years by incorporating it in the soundtrack.)

3. African Skies by Stephan J. Anderson (This piece takes place during the months-long wait Khumba must endure as he takes his leave of absence from the zebra herd in order to prepare for his wings to grow. It's both haunting and beautiful. Haunting because it represents an uncertain time for not just Khumba, but the herd itself with Khumba's absence and Mahki leaving, but beautiful as it represents hope for a better tomorrow.)

4. Let's All Sing Like The Birdies Sing by The Sherman Brothers (The prototypical 'beautiful visuals' song, here, Tiki is treating Khumba and Aziza to a bird show. The song's main purpose is to provide a break from the otherwise authentic soundtrack and give the kids something cool to view and listen to while not truly straying away from the core of the soundtrack.)

5. I'm The Greatest by Ringo Starr (Of all the songs on the soundtrack, this is easily the odd one out. This is done on purpose to showcase Mahki's brash, cocky status as the leader of his own herd, flanked of course by an elephant bodyguard. It's at this point you know Mahki is drunk on power and is ready to assert his dominance among the grasslands. Put simply, this is his villain song and illustrates who Mahki is as a character.)

6. African Military War Drums by The Zulu African Drummer (From here on in, we're back to the African songs. This song is used when Mahki puts the lives of Aziza and Kala in risk and Khumba comes to save them. This is the moment the conflict between Khumba and Mahki reaches its boiling point. Khumba could take Mahki's petty insults, but now that he's brought family into this? It's personal. The drums are aggressive and hard-hitting, representing the nature of this scene.)

7. African Sunrise by Phoenix Music (By far the most intense of the songs in this movie, African Sunrise represents the final battle between Khumba and Mahki, and the moment where Khumba shows all of Africa what he can do with his wings, soaring to victory over a humbled Mahki. This is everything you could want for a final 'battle' song as it's a chilling, exciting piece that sets up a thrilling climax to the conflict.)

8. Spirit of Africa by Bianca Ban (The ending song of the movie, this is another beautiful piece that plays as Khumba teaches his son how to fly and they hover over Africa. It serves as a beautiful second act from the first song and also a triumphant way for the movie to come to an end.)

Length:

The last thing I want to touch on regarding this movie is the length. As you may know, this is easily my shortest movie, clocking in at just under 2000 words. I didn't plan for it to be this way, it just happened. Ultimately, this is a family movie that doesn't require much in terms of plot, but I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. If anything, I think it's an advantage. Family movies need to be fast and simple for kids, as I've learned with Super Grover, so they aren't confused by what they're watching. That doesn't mean you shouldn't try to take chances, but at the end of the day, animated movies for kids don't require long sweeping plots or overly convoluted backstories. A simple enough story with likable characters and good voice-acting is more than enough to do the job. With that said, I don't know if I'll be making any of my movies that short again any time soon. As you've probably noticed, I love putting a lot of detail in my films, maybe too much for my own good!

Final Words:

Khumba the Flying Zebra turned out to be an excellent, fun-filled movie for me and represents yet another step in my attempts to perfect the art of animated films in Last Resort Films. It's one of the shorter films we've seen in the studio in some time and has simple, quick-moving plot with a solid cast and, in my opinion, one of my better soundtracks. 

I understand if this movie isn't for everyone, especially given I stated that this was targeted towards kids, but I think families could come together and have a blast with this movie. This is the type of film that does wonders at the box office and is the backbone of the animation film industry (it's why I like Illumination in spite of their polarizing reception. They know how to bring families in, and it's been shown time and time again). 

Yes, you'll have films like Frozen, Inside Out, Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse, and Encanto, but at the end of the day, sometimes all kids want is to sit down and watch a film with a simple story and fun characters. That's what you're getting with Khumba the Flying Zebra, and it's for those reasons I suspect Khumba will be flying high in the box office and hopefully win some critics over. We'll have to wait and see, however. Until then, this is Jacob Jones, signing out.