Film Review: The Good Dinosaur

The Good Dinosaur. Rated PG (mild themes and threat, some scenes may scare young children). 101 minutes. Directed by Peter Sohn. Screenplay by Meg LeFauve.

With generous amounts of storyline lifted directly from The Lion King, Jungle Book, Ice Age, How to Train Your Dragon and The Croods, the tale of the bond between an awkward young dinosaur, Arlo (Raymond Ochoa), and a tenacious little caveboy, Spot (Jack Bright), is a slippery affair.

While it fails to win points for the originality of its storylines, the visual wonder of the computer-generated animation may well be the most extraordinarily photo-realistic work yet from Pixar Animation Studios. The lavish, gorgeously detailed environments created for the story are superb, but this also serves to highlight the fact that LeFauve’s screenplay fails to live up to the many possibilities.

What is equally confusing is the extent to which the story relies heavily on nightmarish scenarios, many of which will simply terrify the younger members of the film’s potential audience. At the same time, The Good Dinosaur is unable to find a way of offering older children anything much in the way of new and interesting takes on the familiar ‘rites of passage’ formula.

The exceptions are a couple of exquisite night-time sequences, the first being when Arlo’s father introduces him to the local population of fireflies in the hope that the experience may inspire his anxious son to conquer his fears. The second is the incredibly moving sequence when the lost Arlo and Spot realise how important their respective families are to them. By using twigs and drawing circles in the dirt, the film’s most meaningful point of engagement is also its least sophisticated.

When the simple circular motif is used again late in the characters’ journey, The Good Dinosaur makes a powerful statement about the importance of family, which makes it something like an ideal family film for the festive season.

This review was commissioned by the West Australian Newspaper Group.

Film Review: Monsters University

Monsters University. Rated G. 110 minutes. Directed by Dan Scanlon. Screenplay by Daniel Gerson, Robert L Baird and Dan Scanlon.

Verdict: A long, laughless Pixar misfire that plays it deadly straight.

Prequels, like sequels, can be difficult films to make work in their own right – and this prequel to 2001’s hugely successful Monsters, Inc. suffers from running overtime (with young ones obviously struggling to stay the distance), and its over-populated character list that results in bloat and clutter.

Monsters University tells the story of how one-eyed monster Michael Wazowski (voiced by Billy Crystal) met his pal, the big blue monster James P Sullivan (John Goodman), at, well, university. Under the watchful gaze of Dean Abigail Hardscrabble (Helen Mirren), Michael and James must overcome their natural inability to be truly scary in order to keep their place in the university’s prestigious ‘scare program’. Finding themselves relegated to a group of misfits – the university’s Oozma Kappa fraternity who operate from a quaint suburban house – the unlikely group of timid monsters must use all their resources to ensure they have a future as the truly scary monsters they dream of becoming.

There is no doubting the effectiveness of the splendid animation on show here, but there is little of the sheer creative adventurousness we have come to love, admire, and expect from Pixar (Toy Story, A Bug's Life, Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Cars, WALL-E). Gerson, Baird and Scanlon’s screenplay is a limp, cheerless affair that gives the impression of being stuck in an endless loop of deadly earnestness that appears to be have been so keen to secure a G rating that its neglected to include anything of genuine interest.

The one sequence that comes close to inspirational, is when Michael and James inadvertently find themselves trapped in the human world – where in order to return to the monster’s realm, they must scare a group of policeman half to death. As beautifully done as it is (with a fine line about learning to accept our strengths and our weaknesses equally), it also achieves nothing more than to pad out a film that could have done with a major injection of laughs and some form of interesting conflict.

As it stands, Monsters University is a harmless and humourless affair that will keep the kids interested for at least half of its running time. Good luck with the other half.

This review was commissioned by the West Australian Newspaper Group.

Film Review: Cars 2

Cars 2. Rated PG (mild animated violence and coarse language). 113 minutes. Directed by John Lasseter and Brad Lewis. Screenplay by Ben Queen.

Computer animation royalty Pixar Animation Studios are responsible for raising the bar almost impossibly high, and with Cars 2 there is absolutely no doubt that they remain the masters and mistresses of their domain.

The CGI environments they have created for this sequel to the much-maligned Cars (2006) are out of this world – and the cinematography by Jeremy Lasky and Sharon Calahan (Finding Nemo, Toy Story 2, A Bug's Life) is sheer perfection. Michael Giacchino’s (Star Trek, Up, The Incredibles) score, too, is a fantastic accompaniment to the new adventures of Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson) and his loyal best friend Mater the Tow Truck (Larry the Cable Guy) as they hit the international Grand Prix circuit on a whistle-stop tour to promote clean fuel.

What is particularly fantastic about this sequel, though, is the way in which Lasseter, Lewis and Queen take on the celebrated espionage genre – with the result being a better ‘007’ film than practically any of the actual 007 films that have come before it. It’s ambitious and audacious great fun – all edited into a breath-taking, chaotic, high-octane action adventure by Stephen Schaffer (WALL-E, Cars).

Chiefly responsible are Michael Caine (Special Agent Finn McMissile) and Emily Mortimer (Special Agent Holly Shiftwell) who absolutely nail it – with Ms Mortimer, in particular, obviously thoroughly enjoying her riff on everyone from Barbara Feldon’s Agent 99 in Get Smart to Judi Dench’s M in Casino Royale.

As we have come to expect from Pixar in the storytelling department, the now signature themes of the importance of loyalty, trust and friendship all play out effortlessly, and the environmentally-inspired clean fuel subplot is neatly woven into the action. And as I walked home through the carpark, I must admit to having a few sideways glances at all the cars parked around me – contemplating whether or not they had just stopped talking as I approached. Now that’s magic at work.

This review was commissioned by the Geraldton Newspaper Group.

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.