Lilo & Stitch

Lilo & Stitch

Promotional Poster for Lilo & Stitch
Directed by Dean DeBlois
Chris Sanders
Produced by Clark Spencer
Written by Dean DeBlois
Chris Sanders
Starring Daveigh Chase
Chris Sanders
Tia Carrere
David Ogden Stiers
Kevin McDonald
Ving Rhames
Jason Scott Lee
Music by Alan Silvestri
Editing by Darren Holmes
Distributed by Walt Disney Pictures
Release date(s) June 21, 2002
Running time 85 min
Country United States
Language English
Budget $80,000,000
Gross revenue $273,144,151
Followed by Stitch! The Movie (2003)
All Movie Guide profile
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Lilo & Stitch
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Promotional Poster for Lilo & Stitch
Directed by Dean DeBlois
Chris Sanders
Produced by Clark Spencer
Written by Dean DeBlois
Chris Sanders
Starring Daveigh Chase
Chris Sanders
Tia Carrere
David Ogden Stiers
Kevin McDonald
Ving Rhames
Jason Scott Lee
Music by Alan Silvestri
Editing by Darren Holmes
Distributed by Walt Disney Pictures
Release date(s) June 21, 2002
Running time 85 min
Country United States
Language English
Budget $80,000,000
Gross revenue $273,144,151
Followed by Stitch! The Movie (2003)
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

For the television series, see Lilo & Stitch: The Series

Lilo & Stitch is a 2002 American animated feature film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Walt Disney Pictures and Buena Vista Distribution on June 21, 2002. The film was written and directed by Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois, and was the second of three Disney animated features produced primarily at its animation studio at Disney-MGM Studios in Orlando, Florida. The film was rated PG for "mild sci-fi action".

Lilo & Stitch was nominated for the 2003 Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, which ultimately went to Spirited Away.Plot

An extra-terrestrial mad scientist named Dr. Jumba Jookiba (David Ogden Stiers) is imprisoned for illegally experimenting and creating creatures to cause chaos and destruction. His latest experiment is Number 626 (Chris Sanders): a cute, little, blue alien with four arms, two legs and antennae and three spines from his back who is deceptively strong, fast, intelligent, destructive and indestructible.

Captain Gantu (Kevin Michael Richardson), a shark-like alien, is assigned to take 626 to a penal colony, but during the trip, 626 manages to escape in a smaller spacecraft, and crash lands on the small Hawaiian island of Kauaʻi, on Earth. Masquerading as a dog (but looking more like a koala), 626 is adopted by a little girl named Lilo Pelekai (Daveigh Chase) who is living with her 21-year-old sister Nani (Tia Carrere) after their parents died in a car accident. Lilo is lonely and a bit of an outcast until she finds a new friend in 626, whom she names "Stitch." Stitch initially attempts to escape the island but finds that it is impossible because he is afraid of the water and cannot swim because his body is too dense. Stitch resigns himself to stay with Lilo when he spots that he is being watched by Jumba and Galactic Agent Pleakley (Kevin McDonald), who have been assigned to recapture Stitch without being detected by humans. Lilo notes Stitch's violent tendencies and attempts to teach him to relax.

Nani and Lilo are visted by social worker Cobra Bubbles (Ving Rhames), who tells Nani that unless she finds employment and improves their living conditions, he will have to take Lilo into foster care. Nani, with the help of her boyfriend David, tries several times to find employment, but is unable to secure a position as Lilo's attempts to tame Stitch by having him behave as Elvis Presley generally lead to disaster. After one such tiring day, David offers Nani and Lilo a day of surfing at the beach. While the three of them are trying to help Stitch learn how to surf, Jumba and Pleakley attempt to capture Stitch from underwater, leading to Stitch grabbing onto Lilo and dragging her under. David manages to rescue both Lilo and Stitch, but Nani believes that Stitch was attacking Lilo, and sends him away from Lilo much to Lilo's dismay. Stitch returns to Lilo's house alone.

After Jumba and Pleakley's failure, Captain Gantu is assigned to capture Stitch. This leads Jumba, no longer bound by Galactic Code, to aggressively chase Stitch in one last effort, ending in the destruction of Lilo's home. Nani returns home just after this occurs, unfortunately timed with a check-up visit from Cobra Bubbles, causing Lilo to run off fearing that Stitch was responsible for the destruction and didn't care about her, only to be captured by Gantu. Stitch attempts to save her but is instead accused of Lilo's capture by Nani. At this point, Stitch finally speaks to her in English and shows that he is an alien and that he does understand the meaning of ohana, which means "family" and "that nobody gets left behind or forgotten". Jumba is able to capture Stitch in this moment of understanding, but Nani pleads Jumba to let Stitch free and to help save Lilo from Gantu, and he reluctantly does so.

Employing Jumba's spaceship, they and Gantu give chase around the Hawaiian mountains. Stitch manages to land on Gantu's ship and attempts to free Lilo but Gantu reconfigures the angle of the afterburners to blast Stitch off the ship. In a momentary state of unconsciousness, Stitch wakes up just in time to save a frog from being run over by a gasoline truck. Hijacking the same truck, Stitch drives it straight into an active volcano. Stitch taunts Gantu and releases the fuel into the lava. The explosion launches Stitch straight into Gantu's cockpit. Gantu tries to smash Stitch but ends up getting thrown off the ship. Stitch rescues Lilo just in time before the ship explodes. When everyone lands in the ocean, David is coincidentally surfing nearby and he helps transport everyone back to shore.

Immediately, The Grand Councilwoman arrives to arrest Stitch, but becomes reluctant to do so when she sees that he has reformed into a civilized creature. Prodded by Cobra Bubbles (who is revealed to be a former CIA agent who had previously met the Grand Councilwoman at Roswell, NM), Lilo presents her certificate of adoption which makes her Stitch's legal owner, causing the Grand Councilwoman to release the little creature. Stitch's sentence to life in exile provides a loophole; he is now in Lilo and Nani's care as his warders. The movie ends with both Jumba and Pleakley staying on earth to help rebuild Nani, Lilo, and Stitch's home with some of their own alien technology, and with Stitch being fully accepted into Lilo's family.

Throughout the movie, the message provided tells the audience that family must stick together in all cases, however difficult. It also stresses the importance of Lilo and Nani's Hawaiian culture and how it must be kept alive. Furthermore, it is also meant to remind children of the importance of good behavior as well as adults that not all children are "rotten to the core", and that every child has some goodness deep inside.