3) The Jungle Book – King Louie’s Song
Not many films in 2016 have felt like cinema in pure, distilled form quite like The Jungle Book. Probably very few thought Jon Favreau’s reboot would be much to write home about – after all, the film’s only one of so many blockbuster ‘re-imaginings’ being churned out these days. As it turns out, though, he movie is unexpectedly joyous, a burst of color and fluid action that occasionally breaks into song, as in its highlight moment.
What’s not to love about King Louie’s song? There’s the vibrant animation, the classic tune (“I Wan’na Be Like You”), the shadowy mise-en-scene riffing on Apocalypse Now, and Christopher Walken – The Jungle Book‘s mythical Col. Kurtz figure – mo-capped as a giant ape (actually a gigantopithecus, long extinct, but who cares about facts when the sequence is this much fun). It’s a magic moment in a film full of them.