21 May REVIEW – ‘Lilo & Stitch’ is a safe but entertaining and surprisingly touching reimagining
For years now, Disney has been mining its own animated canon in search of live-action gold, and more often than not, the results have ranged from slick but soulless (The Lion King) to pointless and forgettable (Aladdin). So it’s fair to say that expectations are mixed going into Lilo & Stitch, Dean Fleischer Camp’s live-action take on the scrappy, beloved 2002 original. Would it be yet another unnecessary do-over of a film that didn’t need fixing? Or could the studio capture some of the chaotic spirit and emotional resonance that made the original so special?
This new Lilo & Stitch is undoubtedly a safer, more polished affair than its predecessor, and it loses some of the wild spark that made Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois’ animated classic so distinctive. But it’s also sincere, sweetly acted, and surprisingly affecting by the end, with a reworked finale that delivers more emotional heft than one might expect. It may only just justify its own existence, but it certainly earns its place as one of the best Disney live-action remakes thus far.
The story begins in familiar fashion, opening with the intergalactic trial of Dr. Jumba Jookiba (Zach Galifianakis), a wild-eyed alien scientist who has been charged with illegal genetic experimentation. His latest creation, Experiment 626, is a pint-sized blue creature engineered for destruction, with the strength of a hundred men and no concept of empathy or restraint. But when the creature escapes captivity and crash-lands on Earth, specifically the Hawaiian island of Kaua’i, things take a different turn.
Enter Lilo Pelekai (Maia Kealoha), a fiercely independent but dreadfully lonely young girl struggling to find her place in the world following the tragic loss of her parents. Lilo’s older sister, Nani (Sydney Elizebeth Agudong), is now her legal guardian, trying desperately to juggle work, grief, and a mountain of social pressure to keep their tiny family afloat. When Lilo encounters 626, masquerading as a strange dog in a local animal shelter, it’s a collision of two kindred spirits; both destructive, both misunderstood, and both aching for connection.
Lilo adopts him, naming him Stitch and integrating him into their household, unaware that Jumba and the eccentric “Earth expert” Agent Pleakley (a scene-stealing Billy Magnussen) have been dispatched to retrieve him. Meanwhile, Nani struggles to convince an increasingly sceptical social worker, Mrs. Kekoa (Tia Carrere, in a sweet bit of casting symmetry), that she’s fit to care for her sister. The stakes mount, not just from the impending alien retrieval mission, but from the real-world threat of familial separation, and it’s in these grounded emotional beats that the film begins to find its footing.
If the broad outline sounds familiar, that’s because it is. Fleischer Camp and screenwriters Chris Kekaniokalani Bright and Mike Van Waes stick closely to the structure and tone of the original film, resisting the urge to inflate the narrative with elaborate worldbuilding or unnecessary lore. Gone entirely is Captain Gantu, the lumbering Galactic Federation enforcer who played a significant role in the animated film’s latter half. Instead, the movie narrows its focus onto the more intimate dynamics between Lilo, Nani, and Stitch, keeping the story rooted in emotional stakes rather than galactic ones. While the absence of Gantu does slightly diminish the sense of sci-fi scale, it also allows the film to maintain a cleaner narrative throughline, one that emphasises heart over spectacle.
That restraint is, for the most part, a smart choice and proof that it’s not always a bad thing. Fleischer Camp, best known for the wonderfully oddball Oscar-nominated gem Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, brings a similar sense of off-kilter earnestness to Lilo & Stitch, even if the results feel more studio-shaped than auteur-driven. The film never quite captures the anarchic energy that Sanders brought to Stitch the first time around, but his return to voicing the titular character gives this version a welcome continuity. Stitch’s design is softer, rounder, and less spiky—clearly engineered for merchandise shelves—but the performance retains the mischief and confusion that endeared the character to so many in the first place.
What truly elevates this version of Lilo & Stitch is how well Stitch himself has been realised. The CGI work here is genuinely impressive, striking a delicate balance between cartoonish exaggeration and tactile believability. He’s unmistakably an alien, but one who feels like he belongs in the world around him. The animators have achieved preserving his chaotic energy while softening some of the rougher edges from the original design.
His oversized ears, wobbly movements, and wide, toothy grin are all lovingly rendered, but it’s the expressiveness in his eyes that makes the biggest impact. Stitch is adorable, yes, but more importantly, he’s emotionally legible. Whether he’s wreaking havoc on Lilo’s bedroom, pouting in confusion, or tentatively reaching out for affection, his face tells a story even before he speaks (or growls). That emotional clarity goes a long way in rooting the audience’s empathy, and it’s a testament to the film’s visual effects team that Stitch feels not only technically accomplished but genuinely alive.
In her feature debut, Kealoha proves to be a real find. Her Lilo is vulnerable but stubborn, weird but sincere, and she manages to hold her own opposite both CGI chaos and intense emotional scenes. Agudong, too, brings a grounded realism to Nani, capturing the fatigue and frustration of a young woman trying to play too many adult roles at once. Their sisterly bond feels authentic, messy, and lived-in, and it’s in their quieter moments—cooking together, arguing, comforting each other—that the film generates its most affecting material.
Still, it’s impossible to talk about this Lilo & Stitch without acknowledging the calculated sheen of the Disney machine. The island setting is handsomely photographed but rarely feels tactile or specific. Some of the vibrant visual personality of the original, like those watercolour backdrops and expressive character animation, have been replaced by a cleaner, glossier aesthetic. The CGI, while mostly serviceable, occasionally wobbles, especially in scenes that ask Stitch to engage with real-world elements in more complex ways. There’s also a mild sense of repetition, a feeling that we’ve seen this blend of nostalgia and modern polish before, and better, in previous remakes like Cinderella or The Jungle Book.
And yet, despite all this, it works because the film doesn’t try too hard to reinvent the wheel. It knows that the emotional core of Lilo & Stitch lies not in alien chases or visual fireworks, but in a small girl grieving her parents, a sister trying to hold a family together, and a creature learning what it means to be loved. The film is at its best when it leans into that intimacy, and the tear-jerking revised finale, while less bombastic than the original, hits with unexpected emotional clarity. Rather than simply copy-and-paste the climax from the 2002 version, the new film retools it into something more grounded and human, finding catharsis in character rather than chaos. It’s a subtle but smart shift, and one that pays off.
The supporting cast is mostly strong, though some characters inevitably feel less fleshed out. The sublime Magnussen leans into Pleakley’s wide-eyed neuroticism, delivering a performance that’s knowingly campy without tipping into caricature. Galifianakis is a looser fit as Jumba, his delivery veering more toward quirky than menacing, but he maintains enough comic unpredictability to keep things lively. In a similar vein to Glenn Close in the original, Hannah Waddingham brings gravitas to her voice work as the Grand Councilwoman. The choice to cast Carrere as the child welfare agent is a lovely nod to the original, and she brings both warmth and quiet authority to her scenes.
Musically, the film plays a careful balancing act between preserving the original soundtrack’s Elvis-heavy charm and modernising it just enough to fit a new generation. Thankfully, the filmmakers resist the urge to overpopulate the film with pop songs or original ballads, allowing the existing musical cues to breathe. The inclusion of beloved tracks “He Lei Pāpahi No Lilo a me Stitch” and “Hawaiian Roller Coaster Ride” are welcome moments of nostalgic joy. And two uses of the Hawaiian classic “Aloha ‘Oe” will undoubtedly bring a tear to your eye.
What’s notable, and appreciated, is how the film never feels cynical. Even when it falters or plays things too safe, there’s an underlying sincerity that keeps the experience watchable, and even occasionally moving. It’s a remake that respects its source material without suffocating under it. The themes of found family, grief, and alienation are still present, and though they’re handled more cautiously here, they’re not ignored or flattened. In fact, the film’s gentler pace may make it more accessible for younger viewers, even if older fans might miss the scruffier, more chaotic tone of the original.
There will inevitably be debates over whether this remake was necessary. And the truth is, it probably wasn’t. The 2002 film remains a singular oddity in Disney’s animated library, a story that danced to its own beat and refused to conform to traditional formulas. This new version, by contrast, is far more conventional. But that doesn’t mean it’s without merit. By choosing not to drastically reimagine the story, Fleischer Camp instead sharpens the emotional beats, finds new grace notes in familiar scenes, and lets his cast carry the weight. The result is a film that may not astonish, but does something arguably more difficult in today’s IP-driven landscape; it earns your affection, slowly and sincerely.
In the end, this Lilo & Stitch may be best appreciated not as a replacement, but as a companion piece. It’s a softer, more polished remix of a weirder, wilder original, and while it doesn’t try to outdo its predecessor, it manages to stand on its own feet, wobbly as they may sometimes be. In this age of Disney live-action remakes, that’s absolutely a win. And for audiences, especially younger ones, it’s a warm introduction to a story about grief, love, and ohana that still resonates over twenty years later.
It’s not a game-changer, and it’s certainly not perfect, but there’s something oddly comforting about its simplicity. In a sea of remakes trying to justify their own existence through bombast or reinvention, Lilo & Stitch finds value in simply telling its story well. It may not go far enough to be bold, but it goes just far enough to be beautiful. It’s incredibly sweet and undeniably heartfelt, so it’s hard not to be won over by it all when the final credits roll.
Distributor: Walt Disney
Cast: Sydney Elizebeth Agudong, Billy Magnussen, Tia Carrere, Hannah Waddingham, Chris Sanders, Courtney B. Vance, Zach Galifianakis, Maia Kealoha
Director: Dean Fleischer Camp
Producers: Jonathan Eirich, Dan Lin
Screenplay: Chris Kekaniokalani Bright, Mike Van Waes
Cinematography: Nigel Bluck
Production Design: Todd Cherniawsky
Costume Design: Wendy Chuck
Editor: Phillip J. Bartel
Music: Dan Romer
Running Time: 1088 minutes
Release Date: 22nd May 2025 (Australia)