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Lilo And Stitch does have a plot, of sorts, to it, but it doesn’t amount to much.
It’s safe to say that Stitch (voiced by Chris Sanders), aka ‘626’, is a genetic experiment with destructive behaviour, which promptly escapes and goes to Earth. Heading after him, are its creator, Jumba (Zach Galifianakis – The LEGO Batman Movie) and Agent Pleakley (Billy Magnussen – USS Callister: Into Infinity – Black Mirror), who, on arrival, quickly find a way to morph into humans and help cut down the budget by not being in CGI for the duration.
The film shows that the way to overcome life’s trials and tribulations, as a child, is to befriend an alien from outer space as they can certainly help out, even though when being teased early on, for having “no friends”, by bullies, but Lilo (Maia Kealoha) shows she can cope, by getting her own back and pushing one over.
After all, if her gran can adopt a goat, why can’t she adopt Stitch?
The premise isn’t exactly Shakespeare, as her much elder sister, Nani (Sydney Elizebeth Agudong), misses Lilo’s dance school performance, and social worker Mrs. Kekoa (Tia Carrere) thinks the girl isn’t being looked after properly. Quite who reported her as being an apparent problem, I don’t know.
Naturally, though, Nani – seen at one point sporting a Prince and the Revolution “Purple Rain” T-shirt – wants to avoid having Lilo taken into care, thus leading to the film having some positive messages, such as: “Ohaha” means “family”, and family means no-one gets left behind.
Lilo And Stitch has quite a bit of humour throughout, including some offbeat moments, such as while despite Lilo being six years old, yet allowed to go wandering about anywhere, and at any time, there’s a brief scene where she’s outside, in a city, and sharing a hot tub with an elderly businessman. It sounds odd, yet isn’t intending to be contraversial in any way, and simply has Lilo quipping, “I’m in town for the convention”, which elicits a quizzical look from the bloke.
Similarly, there’s a daft moment from the alien pair trying to find Stitch, as with a bit of a short distance between Jumba and Pleakley, the former is looking through binoculars to find the creature, saying, “We need to get closer”, resulting in the latter physically sidling up to him. So, it’s a basic misunderstanding, but in the moment, it gave me a laugh. And, thus, throughout this film, that’s a few more than the average TV sitcom.
There’s also a scene with Stitch on the wing of a plane, tearing bits out of it, as a clear homage to the monkey in Twilight Zone: The Movie. However, I doubt anyone in the target demographic would get the reference, similar to how they won’t know what a convention is.
The pair also use a portal gun, resulting in Jumba repeatedly falling from the ceiling and through the floor, over and over again. I don’t know if the original featured this, or if the device is just something they nicked from the actual Portal games for the hell of it.
I watched this in 3D, which 3D looks better with close-up scenes, such as when Stitch is right up to the camera, whereas distance-viewing looks a bit soft-focus. I know 3D can be a bit of a mixed bag, so when I saw Ne Zha 2 in this Odeon’s screen 12, with every character being introduced in text form, the text on the left-hand side was often out of focus, but on the right, it was fine. I saw A Minecraft Movie in the same screen, but with scant text onscreen during that film, I didn’t encounter any problems.
For Lilo And Stitch, I saw it on screen 5, which often has its share of out-of-focus problems, such as with Venom: The Last Dance, but I’d seen The Surfer in there, in 2D, less than two weeks earlier and it was spot-on, so had clearly had a focus check in the meantime, thus I didn’t expect any major issues. I think not all their screens are great at showing 3D. Screen 2 is a decent one for 3D, as The Wild Robot showed.
That said, it’s a reasonable watch in the 3D format, with a couple of pop-out scenes, such as Zumba shooting a nerf gun at Stitch, which comes out towards us. So, not essential, but it didn’t cost me any extra as I’m on Limitless+
There’s also a mid-credits scene, as described in the video below.
Lilo And Stitch is in cinemas now, but isn’t yet available to pre-order on Blu-ray or DVD. However, once announced, it will appear on the New DVD Blu-ray 3D and 4K releases UK list.
However, you can buy the 2002 movie and assorted sequels and spin-offs, on Blu-ray and DVD.
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 108 minutes
Release date: May 21st 2025
Studio: Walt Disney
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 (ARRIRAW (4.6K))
Cinema: Odeon Trafford Centre
Rating: 6/10
Director: Dean Fleischer Camp
Producers: Jonathan Eirich, Dan Lin
Screenplay: Chris Kekaniokalani Bright, Mike Van Waes
Music: Dan Romer
Cast:
Lilo: Maia Kealoha
Nani: Sydney Elizebeth Agudong
Stitch: Chris Sanders (voice)
Jumba: Zach Galifianakis
Pleakley: Billy Magnussen
Cobra Bubbles: Courtney B Vance
Tutu: Amy Hill
Mrs. Kekoa: Tia Carrere
David: Kaipo Dudoit
Grand Councilwoman: Hannah Waddingham (voice)
Lu’au Manager: Jason Scott Lee
AJ: Celia Kenney
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.