Quartile rating: 7.5/10 · 1 rating
Stowing away after a failed con, a pair of swindlers end up on El Dorado, the fabled "city of gold", where they quickly get in over their heads when they are mistaken as gods by the inhabitants.
The Road to El Dorado is a charming and distinctly voiced animated adventure with a genuinely unusual premise for its era — a buddy comedy con-artist caper set in the Age of Discovery, filtered through a witty, irreverent tone that sets it apart from the Disney formula it was competing against. The plot is fun but fairly episodic and lightweight, never quite capitalizing on its richer thematic possibilities. Voice performances from Kevin Kline and Kenneth Branagh are lively and have strong comic chemistry, though the supporting cast is thinner. Visually it blends traditional 2D with early CG in ways that feel uneven by modern standards, though the production design of El Dorado itself is lush and inventive. Its novelty is its strongest suit — there's nothing quite like it in the animated landscape, with its adult-leaning humor, morally gray protagonists, and Elton John/Tim Rice score. The ending is bittersweet and somewhat rushed, satisfying emotionally but feeling undercooked dramatically.