Ozi: Voice of the Forest review – simian version of Greta Thunberg takes on evil corporation

Orangutan Ozi is an eco chimpfluencer in a film whose excellent animation is let down by underdeveloped characters and blind faith in social media activism

Produced by nature-lover Leonardo DiCaprio’s Appian Way, this is a passable eco-primer for the younger generation, but a limp bit of storytelling about the eponymous junior orangutan (voiced by Amandla Stenberg). Its flower-topknotted hero is a kind of simian Greta Thunberg, bent on using her influencer clout to protect her rainforest home from an evil corporation, but the film doesn’t exactly lead us into Watership Down territory.

Anthropomorphism these days doesn’t just mean talking animals; it means they use tablets and social media as well. (There’s something a bit wrong about that in a film about the sanctity of nature.) No matter: after being separated from her parents in a Lion King-esque conflagration, Ozi is brought to an animal sanctuary where she takes to technology like an ape to an all-you-can-eat buffet. Her human carer draws the line, though, at her using a device from Greenzar, the company responsible for orphaning Ozi in the first place. But the chimpfluencer won’t stay away, especially when she realises her folks are still alive in the corporation’s shiny biosphere.

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