Film Review: Toy Story 3

Toy Story 3. 108 minutes. Rated G. Directed by Lee Unkrich. Screenplay by Michael Arndt. Based on the original story by Lee Unkrich, Andrew Stanton and John Lasseter.

It will come as no surprise to discover there’s a lot going on in this third (and apparently final) entry into the popular Toy Story franchise from Pixar and Disney. Pixar supremo John Lasseter is credited with the original story. So, too, are Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich. Then there’s the ‘story’ credits, which also belong to Stanton and Unkrich. If ever there was an example of a fantastic recipe spoiled by too many cooks, then this grim and surprisingly humourless film is it.

Young Andy is off to college, and the time has come for him to allocate his wordly possessions into one of the following boxes: trash, attic (for storage) or college. Needless to say, our lovable rogues gallery of toys are duly separated from each other – and the film then focuses on how they all get back together. It’s a well-worn Toy Story formula that has now officially out-stayed its welcome. It suffers, too, from a peculiarly long and dreary set-up, which had the capacity audience of birthday party-celebrating littlies squirming in their seats with boredom.

The unquestionable charm of the ground-breaking original, released in 1995, was that it catapulted us into the delightful, pint-sized world of a group of toys who, in spite of our world-weary cynicism, had undeniably come ‘alive’. The use of toys that, as adults, we affectionately remembered from our childhoods (Mr Potato Head was a particularly inspired choice), were suddenly given renewed leases on life as movie-stars, while the new generation were suddenly as obsessed with slinky dogs, cowboys and little plastic green soldiers as we had been. It was a brilliant masterstroke of generational cross-over and audience engagement – and the resulting global success and acclaim was well-deserved.

It was also the first film to be made entirely of computer generated imagery – and Pixar would use the opportunity to dazzle us with their creativity, imagination, story-telling prowess and, while they were at it, set the benchmark for every film that would follow (A Bug’s Life, The Incredibles, Wall-E to name just three). With Toy Story 3, however, the magic has dimmed. As audiences for these kinds of technological adventures, we are now a great deal harder to impress. Yes, there are some exhilarating sequences of dare-devil escapades and the CGI animation is typically flawless. But perhaps Pixar have spoiled us rotten with their abilities – because much of that eye-popping wonder is now just expected.

There’s a determined effort to capture the teenage market with some of the more risqué scenes starring Ken and Barbie (which are hilarious), and a throughline featuring an evil, abandonded teddy bear who rules the Daycare Centre (where our cast eventually end up) as some kind of Alcatraz for toys. It’s really dark territory – and the scenes where the toys prepare to face extermination in a burning pit of fire are just plain cruel and extreme.

When it finally capitulates into long, drawn-out, emotional manipulation, we’re left with the really uncomfortable feeling that the toys in Toy Story 3 are not the only things to have been played with. It’s going to take something else entirely to recapture our imaginations. I don’t doubt Pixar will discover what that might be – but it’s certainly not this.

DVD Review: Alien

Alien. 117 minutes (Director's Cut 137 minutes). Rated M. Directed by Ridley Scott. Written by Dan O'Bannon

Thirty years after its original release, Ridley Scott's Alien remains one of the most influential films of the contemporary science fiction genre – not to mention a terrifically thrilling film in its own right. Alien firmly belongs in the era of impressively resourceful and imaginative filmmaking – free from the now familiar obsession with computer generated imagery which, at worst, has replaced the artform's intrinsic storytelling value with a catalogue of eye-popping visual effects and little else.

The commercial towing spaceship Nostromo's return to earth is interrupted by a mysterious transmission from a distant planetoid (LV-426). The crew, awoken from hyper-sleep by 'Mother' (the ship's computer), are surprised to find that the Nostromo has been been redirected to investigate the origins of the distress call. Landing on the environmentally hostile LV-426, Warrant Officer Ripley (a 30 year-old Sigourney Weaver in her feature film debut), eventually deciphers the signal as some kind of warning while, at the same time, the crew discover a derelict alien spacecraft that has crashed onto the planetoid's surface. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Alien's lasting effectiveness is powered by Ridley Scott's commitment to telling us a fantastic story and his uncompromising vision for how his film should look and feel. Unlike today, when much of a film's visual effectiveness is added courtesy of computers, every detail of what appears onscreen in Alien needed to exist in front of the camera as the film was being shot. This included not only a range of immensely detailed sets, special effects, models and miniatures, but also the massive Nostromo set (constructed to precise NASA specifications), which was built as one massive system of complex passageways and chambers – complete with a floor made up of upside-down milk crates painted silver.

Scott, too, relentlessly drove his outstanding cast to levels of extreme emotional and physical discomfort – heightening the real sense of apprehension, claustrophobia and panic among the Nostromo's increasingly fearful crew. The Swiss surrealist H R Giger's Alien design (based on his lithograph Necronom IV), not only radically departed from the human-like alien designs of past science fiction films, but also provided the film with its wealth of startling, other-worldy visual originality. 

The success of Alien resulted in James Cameron's Aliens, Alien 3 (abandoned by director David Fincher) and Alien: Resurrection (Jean-Pierre Jeunet), while Alien vs Predator (2004) and Alien vs Predator – Requiem (2007) succeeded in achieving nothing but compromising (and ending) the series in a flurry of tacky exploitation. Ridley Scott has recently announced that he has commenced work on a prequel – Alien 5 – in 3D. Given that he has expressed disappointment with how the series was left to die a slow and artless death, it will be fascinating to see how Scott approaches his return to a story that began his, now, illustrious career.

This review was commissioned by the Geraldton Newspapers Group and was published in the print edition of the Geraldton Guardian.