Excellent but underrated film

A Brilliant Conflict

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

"Kung Fu Panda: Secrets of the Furious Five" is a short film that runs for slightly over 20 minutes and came out a couple months after the very first "Kung Fu Panda" back in 2008, probably as a DVD feature. Since then there is a second movie, several other short films and even a television series. The third feature movie will come out in 2016. In this short here, Po tells us and a class of rabbits 5 little stories about Kung Fu masters. It's really more about morale than comedy although here and there you find some slapstick. It's certainly suitable for children and especially those who enjoy the movies should like it too. My favorite from the stories is the second one about the snakes (maybe an 8/10) as it perfectly illustrates the biological aspects of venomous and constrictor snakes and I quite liked the way they displayed it with all these bands.The director Raman Hui has worked on quite a few animated movies and was the co-director of the third "Shrek" movie. The animation style in this "Kung Fu Panda" short is very similar to the full length movies. What I also found interesting were the different animal motives in the sequences, such as sheep for helpless and intimidated animals and crocodiles and bulls for antagonists. There's probably more. This one here won 4 Annie Awards (animation Oscars) and I can see why. I had a good time watching and I recommend it.

This is an animation short that ties in with the first Kung Fu Panda films with Po the panda ropes in by Shifu to teach the philosophy of Kung Fu to a group of young bunnies at a martial arts school. However it is not the crash bang wallop of Kung Fu that Po teaches but the positive traits that each of the Furious Five developed.So you have flashbacks of the Furious Five and how they developed their skills and the virtues they developed. It avoids preachiness and younger viewers would be highly entertained.The animation is very good and up to feature film standard and they have attracted an all star cast for the voices.

My thanks go out to Dreamworks on such a great piece of marketing! 'The next Kung Fu Panda Adventure!' - sprawled in bold letters across the front of the DVD case. Be aware folks - this is not a feature length movie, it is 24 minutes of not a lot. As a previous member has posted, yes it probably was our fault for not reading the back which states '24 Min's approx'. I hope it raised the much needed funds for buying the MD's Christmas Champagne hamper. What's next DW - 'Purchasing this DVD enrols you into our monthly subscription plan, unless you cancel within 30 seconds?' I will be reading the small print on all future releases from Dreamworks.

As Dragon Warrior, Po has had to face many challenges but on this day he must face one that would intimidate any great warrior – training the newest recruit of bunnies in the way of kung-fu. Left alone to fend for himself by Shifu, Po finds his class are only interested in the fighting part of the art and are keen to get down to kicking one another as soon as possible. In order to educate them in the true ways of the art, Po tells them of the Furious Five and how they became masters by learning life lessons of patience, courage, confidence, self-control and compassion.As with the animated films from Pixar, Dreamworks included this short film on the Kung-Fu Panda DVD and I decided to give it a try. In a way it is a fitting inclusion to the main film because to my mind both the film and the short are enjoyable for what they are but at the same time are not quite up to the quality of the products produced by Pixar. With this film its main problem is that the plot is just too obvious in the moralising compared to some of the brilliant shorts from Pixar that can deliver the same message but are generally very inventive and clever. I didn't really get this here but, if you ignore this weakness of comparison then the short is still quite entertaining.It is not really ever hilarious but it does consistently amuse across the twenty minutes and it doesn't really ram the moral down your throat (although it does push it into your mouth). The animation is mixed – perhaps for financial reasons but it does work within the context of the short. The bits with Po and his class are of the same quality as in the main film but the stories that make up the majority of the running time are delivered in a more hand-drawn style that looks cheaper (because, by comparison, it is). However don't let this take away from how good it looks because it is still stylish – sort of like the animation that opens the main film albeit it not as striking or as well done as that. Each story is relatively straight forward with a moral at the end of each one but they do more or less work.The voice work is a little distracting though – not so much for what they do but more the obvious absences. Black and Hoffman are good, each reprising their voices in the main part of the short film – Black in particular puts a lot of energy into it, but the Furious Fives themselves not so much. Cross is good as Crane (probably having as many words as in the main film) but the others are mostly absent. Some of the characters are children in their stories so therefore it would not have been sensible to use adult voices but it is a bit strange why Chan or Rogen couldn't have found a bit of time to record the couple of lines needed for this – especially considering how few lines they had in the main film.Either way the short is solid and entertaining with a solid if obvious moral message for the kids (and bunnies). That said it does feel a bit lacking in inspiration and does give the impression that it was made because it had to be rather than made out of a good idea or passion for the project – a cynical view perhaps but it is hard not to feel that at points, not due to something the film does but things that similar films do so much better.