Mulan is a 1998 American animated musical coming-of-age action-adventure film based on the Chinese legend of Hua Mulan, and produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation. The film was directed by Barry Cook and Tony Bancroft and produced by Pam Coats, from a screenplay by Rita Hsiao, Chris Sanders, Philip LaZebnik, and the writing team of Raymond Singer and Eugenia Bostwick-Singer, and a story by Robert D. San Souci. It features five original songs that were written by singer and composer Matthew Wilder and lyricist David Zippel, and an original musical orchestral score composed and conducted by Jerry Goldsmith. Ming-Na Wen, Eddie Murphy, Miguel Ferrer, and BD Wong star in the English version as Mulan, Mushu, Shan Yu, and Captain Li Shang, respectively, while Jackie Chan provided the voice of Li Shang for the Chinese dubs of the film. The film's plot takes place in China during an unspecified Imperial dynasty, where Fa Mulan, daughter of aged warrior Fa Zhou, impersonates a man to take her father's place during a general conscription to counter a Hun (Xiongnu) invasion.
Mulan was the first of three features produced primarily at the Disney animation studio at Disney–MGM Studios (now Disney's Hollywood Studios) in Bay Lake, Florida. Development for the film began in 1994, when a number of artistic supervisors were sent to China to receive artistic and cultural inspiration.
Mulan premiered at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles on June 5, 1998, and was released in the United States on June 19. The film received positive reviews from critics and the public, who praised the animation, plot, characters (particularly the title character), and musical score. It was a commercial success, grossing $304 million worldwide against a production budget of $90 million. It earned a Golden Globe and Academy Award nomination for its music and won several Annie Awards, including Best Animated Feature. It was then followed by a direct-to-video sequel, Mulan II in 2004. A live-action remake directed by Niki Caro was released on September 4, 2020.
Plot
The Huns invade China by breaching the Great Wall. The Emperor orders a general mobilization, with conscription notices requiring one man from each family to join the Imperial Army. Fa Mulan, an adventurous young woman, hopes to bring honor to her family. She is arranged to meet a matchmaker to demonstrate her fitness as a future wife, but is deemed a disgrace after several mishaps.
Fa Zhou, Mulan's elderly father and a renowned military veteran, is conscripted. Mulan tries dissuading him from going, but he insists that he must do his duty. Fearing for his life, she cuts her hair and takes her father's sword and armor, disguising herself as a man so that she can enlist in his stead. Quickly learning of her departure, Mulan's grandmother prays to the family's ancestors for Mulan's safety. In the family's temple, the spirits of the ancestors are awakened by Mushu, a small red dragon who is a disgraced former family guardian. The Great Ancestor decides that the powerful stone dragon guardian should guide Mulan, and sends Mushu to wake him. After accidentally destroying the guardian's statue, Mushu decides to redeem himself to the ancestors by personally aiding Mulan. He is accompanied by Cri-Kee, a "lucky" cricket.
Reporting to the training camp, Mulan passes as a man named "Fa Ping", with Mushu providing encouragement and clumsy guidance throughout her deception. Under the command of Captain Li Shang, she and her fellow recruits—including three named Yao, Ling, and Chien-Po—gradually become trained soldiers. The Emperor's belligerent counsel, Chi-Fu, threatens to dissuade the Emperor from allowing Shang's men to fight. Mushu and Cri-Kee then write a fake letter from Shang's father, General Li, ordering Shang to follow the main imperial army into the mountains. The reinforcements set out and discover that the Huns have slaughtered Li and his troops.
As the soldiers march up a mountain pass, the Huns' ruthless leader Shan Yu leads an ambush to attack them. Mulan uses a Huolongchushui cannon to trigger an avalanche and bury the Huns, but is badly injured. Shang and the soldiers discover Mulan's true identity while her wound is bandaged. Instead of executing Mulan as the law requires, Shang spares her life, saying that a life for a life, and his debt is repaid, and expels her from the army before departing for the Imperial City to report the Huns' defeat. Mulan, however, later discovers Shan Yu and several of his warriors have survived. Mulan travels to the city to warn Shang just as the Huns seize the palace and take the Emperor hostage. In the ensuing fight, Shan Yu's men are quickly defeated and Mulan lures Shan Yu onto the roof, and ultimately pins him down with his own sword. Guided by Mulan, Mushu uses a giant skyrocket to propel Shan Yu into a fireworks launching tower, killing him.
The Emperor and the city's assembled inhabitants praise Mulan for having saved them, and they bow to her in honor. She accepts the Emperor's crest and Shan Yu's sword as gifts but declines his offer to join the royal council. Mulan returns home and presents these gifts to her father, but he ignores them, happy to have her back. While Mushu is reinstated as a Fa family guardian, Shang becomes enamored with Mulan and accepts her invitation to stay for dinner.
Cast
Ming-Na Wen as Mulan (singing voice provided by Lea Salonga) Eddie Murphy as Mushu BD Wong as Captain Li Shang (singing voice provided by Donny Osmond) Miguel Ferrer as Shan Yu, the Hun chieftain Harvey Fierstein as Yao Gedde Watanabe as Ling (singing voice provided by Matthew Wilder) Jerry Tondo as Chien-Po James Hong as Chi-Fu, an imperial mandarin Soon-tek Oh as Fa Zhou Freda Foh Shen as Fa Li June Foray as Grandmother Fa (singing voice provided by Marni Nixon) Frank Welker as Khan (Mulan's horse), Cri-Kee (Mulan's cricket), and Hun Miriam Margolyes as The Matchmaker James Shigeta as General Li George Takei as First Ancestor Pat Morita as The Emperor of China Mary Kay Bergman as various ancestors Barry Cook and Tony Bancroft as the fireworks palace attendants
Kelly Chen, Coco Lee and Xu Qing voiced Mulan in the Cantonese, Taiwanese Mandarin and Mainland standard versions of the film respectively, while Jackie Chan provided the voice of Li Shang in all three Chinese versions and appeared in the version of promotional music videos of "I'll Make a Man Out of You". Taiwanese comedian Jacky Wu provided the voice of Mushu in the Mandarin version.
Production
Development In 1989, Walt Disney Feature Animation Florida had opened with 40 to 50 employees, with its original purpose to produce cartoon shorts and featurettes. However, by late 1993, following several animation duties on Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King, Disney executives were convinced to allow the Feature Animation Florida studios to produce their first independent film. Around that same time, Disney Feature Animation developed an interest in Asian-themed legends, beginning with the optioning of several books by children's book author Robert D. San Souci, who had a consulting relationship with Disney executive Jay Dyer. Also around that time, a short straight-to-video film titled China Doll about an oppressed and miserable Chinese girl who is whisked away by a British Prince Charming to happiness in the West was in development. Thomas Schumacher asked San Souci if he had any additional stories, in response to which San Souci turned in a manuscript of a book based on the Chinese poem "The Song of Fa Mu Lan". Ultimately, Disney decided to combine the two separate projects.
Following the opening of the Feature Animation Florida studios, Barry Cook, who had served as a special-effects animator since 1982, had directed the Roger Rabbit cartoon Trail Mix-Up produced at the satellite studio. At a lunch invitation with Thomas Schumacher, Cook was offered two projects in development: a Scottish folk tale with a dragon or Mulan. Knowledgeable about the existence of dragons in Chinese mythology, Cook suggested adding a dragon to Mulan, in which a week later, Schumacher urged Cook to drop the Scottish project and accept Mulan as his next project. Following this, Cook was immediately assigned as the initial director of the project, and cited influences from Charlie Chaplin and David Lean during production. While working as an animator on the gargoyles for The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Tony Bancroft was offered to co-direct the film following a recommendation from Rob Minkoff, co-director of The Lion King, to Schumacher, in which he accepted. He joined the creative team by early 1995.
In the summer of 1994, the production team sent a select group of artistic supervisors to China for three weeks to take photographs and drawings of local landmarks for inspiration; and to soak up local culture. Key members of the creative team at the time—producer Pam Coats, director Barry Cook, art director Ric Sluiter, layout supervisor Robert Walker, and Mulan's supervising animator Mark Henn—were invited to travel to China as a research trip to study the landscape, people, and history of the original legend. From June 17 to July 2, 1994, the research trip flew to Beijing, China, which is where Coats became inspired by the placement of flags on the Great Wall. They also toured Datong, Luoyang, Xi'an, Jiayuguan, Dunhuang, and Guilin.
Writing In its earliest stages, the story was originally conceived as a Tootsie-inspired romantic comedy film where Mulan, who was a misfit tomboy who loves her father, is betrothed to Shang, whom she has not met. On her betrothal day, her father Fa Zhou carves her destiny on a stone tablet in the family temple, which she shatters in anger, running away to forge her own destiny. In November 1993, Chris Sanders, who had just finished storyboard work on The Lion King, was hoping to work on The Hunchback of Notre Dame until Schumacher appointed him to work on Mulan instead. Acting as Head of Story, Sanders grew frustrated with the romantic comedy aspect of the story, and urged producer Pam Coats to be more faithful to the original legend by having Mulan leave home because of the love for her father. This convinced the filmmakers to decide to change Mulan's character in order to make her more appealing and selfless.
Sequence Six—in which Mulan takes her father's conscription order, cuts her long hair, and dons her father's armor—served as a pivotal moment in the evolution of Mulan's character. Director Barry Cook explained that the sequence initially started as a song storyboarded by Barry Johnson and redrawn by character designer Chen-Yi Chang. Following the story changes to have Mulan leave to save her father, the song was dropped. Storyboard artist and co-head of story Dean DeBlois was tasked to revise the sequence, and decided to board the sequence with "minimal dialogue". Assisted with an existing musical selection from another film score courtesy of Sanders, the sequence reel was screened for Peter Schneider and Thomas Schumacher, both of whom were impressed. DeBlois stated, "Sequence Six was the first sequence that got put into production, and it helped to establish our 'silent' approach." Additionally, General Li was not originally going to be related to Shang at all, but by changing the story, the filmmakers were able to mirror the stories of both Shang's and Mulan's love for their fathers. As a Christian, Bancroft declined to explore Buddhism within the film.