Lilo & Stitch (2025) is directed by Dean Fleischer Camp, featuring a screenplay by Chris Kekaniokalani Bright and Mike Van Waes. It stars Sydney Agudong, Maia Kealoha, Chris Sanders, Zach Galifianakis, Billy Magnussen, Amy Hill, Courtney B. Vance, Kaipo Dudoit, Tia Carrere, Hannah Waddingham, and Jason Scott Lee. This is a “live-action” remake of the 2003 Disney animated classic about Stitch (Sanders), an alien fugitive who crash-lands in Hawaii and befriends Lilo (Kealoha), a 6-year-old in desperate need of a friend. Stitch becomes an immediate pain for Lilo’s older sister, Nani (Agudong), who’s already struggling to get by after the death of their parents. Trio’s efforts to form a makeshift family are unfortunately cut short when Stitch’s alien pursuers arrive seeking to imprison him once again.

Agudong and Kealoha are well-cast, embodying the two sisters in live action as well as one could hope for. Because the majority of the film is just a carbon copy of the original, there’s little opportunity for the cast to make their portrayals stand out. The sisters are likable, but they are unable to elevate their characters, which is more than can be said about almost every other performance. Nearly every other portrayal of the characters we recognize is a step down, which wouldn’t be as grating if the film didn’t constantly remind us of the far superior original. These also aren’t a step down in the sense that they try something different and fail; they’re just lazy, fun-sucking, soulless performances. Big names like Galifianakis, Magnussen, Vance, and Waddingham feel as if they’re only here to add their names to the poster, yet they probably account for an egregious portion of the film’s budget. The only somewhat fun performance is Chris Sanders, who returns as the voice of Stitch. The problem is, Stitch was never a very vocal/dialogue-driven character to begin with. His various grunts and growls are just more of the same, but the character is admittedly a success if the goal was to create a faithful copy. I just don’t understand why that would be the goal in the first place.

A majority of the film is a shameless copy of the original, but worse for several reasons. The few changes and additions in the script are either superfluous or serve to weaken the story’s cumulative impact. Stitch is unsurprisingly present throughout, but there’s a feeling that the filmmakers were instructed to show him as little as possible, most likely to save money on visual effects. Jumba (Galifianakis) and Pleakley (Magnussen) disguise themselves as humans for the majority of the film, a decision that strips away a significant portion of their personality and visual flair. I can’t think of one reason to do this other than pinching pennies, especially when everything else is annoyingly faithful to the original. 

The CGI we do get is completely uninspired, looking rushed, cheap, and generally ugly. A significant portion of the designs don’t translate well to this medium, and the filmmaker’s insistence on being faithful prevents even the most minor concessions. The effects simply aren’t compelling on any level, trading the original’s efficient visual storytelling for on-the-nose spoken exposition and cliche character tropes. Because the visuals aren’t nearly enough to hold our attention, the original film’s heavy use of music-driven montages falls flat in this context. The musical cues seem mandated, rather than naturally integrated, which isn’t something I should feel about hearing Elvis songs during a movie set in Hawaii.

Overall, this is yet another of Disney’s soulless, greedy “live-action” remakes. It fails to improve on a single element of the original film, yet constantly invites us to make comparisons. There’s no reason for it to exist other than Disney’s desperation to curb its recent losses from Marvel and Star Wars. This doesn’t happen often, but I genuinely lost interest halfway through. I suppose it’s a tolerable experience, but there’s absolutely no reason to watch it over the original. It’s the prime example of a movie that shouldn’t exist, but made a killing at the box office anyway. If you financially support these cynical displays of corporate greed, please stop; I’m begging you. Hollywood only hears your wallet, and what you’re telling them is that you just want lazy copies of the movies you loved as a child, but inferior in every way. Please, don’t be an idiot. Just watch the original and forget this exists. F