Disney’s live-action Lilo & Stitch (2025) lands a hair above the studio’s recent remake baseline, but that’s faint praise. Dean Fleischer Camp preserves some of the original’s charm—chiefly the inherent cuteness and chaos of Stitch and a relative lack of rubbery, wall-to-wall CG—while stretching the story to a heavier, slower, and less colorful feature that rarely justifies revisiting it over the 2002 animated Lilo & Stitch. Compared with glossy retreads like The Lion King, Mufasa, Dumbo, or The Little Mermaid, this is more tolerable; compared with the animated classic, it feels muted.
Fleischer Camp brings the gentle, handmade sensibility that made Marcel the Shell with Shoes On so endearing: soft palettes, unfussy staging, and an obvious affection for ʻohana. But the self-serious tone and an extra twenty-plus minutes of runtime sand down the original’s snap. Much of the plot is faithfully ported over—Lilo adopts a “dog” who’s secretly Experiment 626, chaos ensues, family fractures and repairs—but the beats play slower and safer, the images less vibrant, and the comic anarchy that defined Chris Sanders’ cartoon is mostly replaced by sweetness and sentiment.
The casting helps. Maia Kealoha (Lilo) and Sydney Agudong (Nani) are warm presences who sell the sisterly push-pull, even when the movie around them drifts. Stitch himself remains a reliable agent of mayhem; the hybrid practical/CG approach works better than the full-digital sheen that has smothered other Disney remakes. Still, the filmmaking rarely finds a new angle on this story or a reason to exist beyond brand maintenance.
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Lilo & Stitch sits slightly above the studio’s recent live-action output on craft and tone, yet it never makes a persuasive case for itself. Fleischer Camp’s care is visible; the spark isn’t. If you want the full jolt of color, bite, and heart, the fully animated Lilo & Stitch remains the go-to.
Score: 4/10
Lilo & Stitch (2025)
- Cast: Maia Kealoha, Sydney Agudong, Chris Sanders, Zach Galifianakis, Billy Magnussen, Courtney B. Vance, Amy Hill, Tia Carrere, Kaipo Dudoit, Hannah Waddingham
- Director: Dean Fleischer Camp
- Genre: Adventure, Comedy, Family, Science Fiction
- Runtime: 108 minutes
- Rated: PG
- Release Date: May 23, 2025
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