
Movie review
The One and Only Ivan
Woke Score
Lower is better
- Release Date
- August 21, 2020
- Age Rating
- PG
- Runtime
- 93 min
Where to Watch
United States · Last checked 5/13/2026
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Breakdown
Factors & Ratings
These are the editorial factors and ratings behind our score for The One and Only Ivan.
Representation / casting choices
Natural voice casting for CGI animals (Sam Rockwell, Angelina Jolie, Brooklynn Prince, etc.) with mixed actors; no audience-visible forced diversity, signaling, or story-world mismatches.
Political / ideological dialogue
Light lines on captivity being wrong and animals deserving freedom; fully story-appropriate with no modern activist identity rhetoric.
Identity-driven story themes
None; narrative is 100% about animal friendship, memory, and escape with zero race/gender/queer arcs.
Institutional / cultural critique
Mild activist-style push against commercial animal captivity in circuses/malls for profit; remains setting-appropriate resistance in an animal story without modern identity politics, capitalism-as-whiteness, or Western cultural institutional attacks.
