GOAT boasts gorgeous animation, great music, and an inspiring rookie story that makes it not just a great family movie, but a great sports movie as well.
GOAT is directed by Tyree Dillihay and produced by basketball player Stephen Curry who makes his voice-acting debut in the film. Caleb McLaughlin stars as Will Harris, an anthropomorphic goat who aspires to become the greatest of all time at a basketball-like sport known as roarball following in the footsteps of his idol Jett Fillmore, a legendary roarball player. Gabrielle Union, Aaron Pierre, Nicola Coughlan, and Patton Oswalt also star.
Goat has gorgeous animation. It’s set in a jungle inspired city that lifts elements of urban landscapes like Brooklyn to mix them with the wildlife-inspired backdrops that reflects its characters from the animal kingdom. Environments include luscious naturalistic backdrops filled with softly landed almost impressionistic pastel colours of moss green and warm oranges and reds. And a great use of lighting and shadows make the scenes feel textured and stylistic. There is a beautiful flow to the sketch-inspired animation style that balances fluidity with roughness. Some outstanding animated camera movements that follow characters around in a dynamic way, feel very fluid, handheld and fast paced.
So many of the locations we visit throughout the film are visually inventive, like our main character’s hometown which feels like a cross between a cozy urban neighbourhood and a jungle-inspired landscape with vines and plants overflowing the sky trains that run through the city. The stadiums which the characters perform in are all incredibly unique, like a polar-bear-inspired stadium where basketball is played on ice. This keeps the film visually intriguing as we change locations throughout the tournament. The world of the film is also filled with colourful and bold character designs that lean into the personalities of each animal and what makes them funny. Their outfits and personal style reflect their aesthetic as a rhinoceros, a crocodile or a panther.
The emotional core of the film comes through the journey Will has toward becoming a basketball star, ever since his late mother told him to dream big. There’s some good commentary on the life experience of going from a working class neighbourhood to striving to be a sports star. The sort of neighbour Will comes from visually replicates the aesthetic of an environment with markers of poverty and struggle represented by literal trash bags piling up, overgrown moss and plants., and old mouldy couches. Those contrasted by the sleek visual aesthetic shown in the executive offices of the team’s manager and star players. The script also cleverly deploys internet language and African American Vernacular English in a way that feels authentic to the real-life context it is paying tribute to, of basketball stars working their way from humble beginnings to becoming stars.
The story in GOAT has an incredibly fast pace, and while it takes time introducing its characters, many of the struggles that need to be overcome arrive in the third act and are sorted out quite quickly. This can feel too fast at times, when characters lose and then come back to their strengths all within the span of 5 minutes or less, but the way it ties back to the emotional relationship Will has with his mother, as well as star-player Jet Filmore that he looks to as a role model means it still hits all the right beats in the end.
GOAT boasts gorgeous animation, great music, and an inspiring rookie story that makes it not just a great family movie, but a great sports movie as well.
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