Kids Need Pixar (and Pixar Needs Adults)

Editor’s note: This blog post is somewhat in response to Nick’s earlier Pixar blog available right here on this site.

Kid’s movies suck nowadays. They’re just terrible. For every Kung Fu Panda there’s another Ice Age. For every Up there’s a Monster’s Vs. Aliens, or worse yet, a Megamind. In the past 20 years the ratio for terrible to good kids movies has to be something like 20:1. The past year alone has seen Rango, Rio, Hoodwinked 2, Gnomeo and Juliet, Kung Fu Panda 2, Megamind, and others either under-perform or completely flounder at the box office.

In the pantheon of child-aimed movies, only Pixar seems to release consistent, quality pictures that not only appeal to kids and their parents, but also tackle diverse and complicated subject matter like death (Up), growing up, loyalty, and friendship (all Toy Story 3), love (WALL-E), finding your place in life (Ratatouille, which is good no matter what Nick says), and friendship (Cars). The only other animated project in the last 5 years to even rival Pixar’s films has been the excellent How to Train Your Dragon, a movie which I actually thought was better than Toy Story 3.

In the 1980s, I remember watching films like The Last Unicorn, The Hobbit, The Fox and the Hound, The Secret of Nimh and various other films that elicited emotion, excitement, and awe from my siblings and I. In the early to mid-1990s, Disney seemed to hit their stride, releasing four critically acclaimed films in a row (The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King). Since this time period, only Pixar has released consistently great entertainment for children.

It is true that I have somewhat trashed Toy Story 3 in the past. I found it to be too derivative of the first two films and I thought it played more like a video game than a movie in certain spots. But it also taught children a great lesson about growing up, moving on, and finding your place in the world. It bled themes like loyalty in friends and loved ones. It was just so very mature. Certain themes and elements reminded me very much of other mature animated works like The Last Unicorn and An American Tale. I very much appreciated Pixar’s efforts even if I enjoyed Toy Story 2 more than 3. What does that even matter if Pixar is the only company releasing films that don’t pander to kids like they’re idiots?

2009’s Up, quite possibly my favorite Pixar film and also the best Indiana Jones-style adventure movie in a long, long time, had me and my fellow movie-goers in tears in the first five minutes. Every time I watch Up, I still cry at the heartbreak and loss Carl experiences. I get emotional even now as I think about the Michael Giacchino-penned score. Kids got great entertainment from Up, but they were also subject to life-lessons they absolutely needed to hear. Meanwhile, the latest dreck released by Dreamworks probably involves farting ogres and a character voiced by Wanda Sykes (I love that Pixar doesn’t need to rely on stunt-casting to sell a movie).

I will continue to patronize Pixar films (except the Cars franchise — because Larry the Cable Guy is terrible) due to their mature subject matter, their ability to teach kids the lessons they need to hear, their excellent stories, and their cutting edge animation. I’ll be the first in line to see Brave. Hey Nick, wanna join me?

-Z-

Pixar Is For Kids, Right?

Pixar needs to cut it out.

I am sure, loyal followers, you are asking, “Nick, what are you talking about?” Well, I’ll tell you. I recently saw the tease trailer for the Pixar’s next film Brave.

Now, I am sure the movie will be fine, and it will rake in a bajillion dollars. My issue (or growing concern, if you will) is that Pixar is moving away from what made the studio the crown jewel it was in the first place.  Before they made really good kid movies that adults could enjoy. However, over the past five years or so, it seems that they switched to making really good movies for adults that kids can enjoy as well.

The last few films have seemed to focus more and more on dark subject material. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing for a family movie, but it seems that Pixar is more concerned about what boundaries they can get away with instead of focusing on other elements of their movies (namely, their stories and characters).

Worked for him.

This somewhat started in The Incredibles. I really enjoyed that movie, but I noticed there were several background, throwaway lines that pushed some minor boundaries. For example, some of Syndrome’s henchmen were humorously playing a drinking game when citizens were fleeing in terror. Granted, this isn’t bad at all, but I think the powers at be at Pixar saw that they can really start adding in some adult items.

A few years later, Ratatouille came out and it was all downhill from there. I need to confess, unlike the rest of the world, I did not care for Ratatouille. I felt it the story was all over the place with things just happening for the convenience of the plot. However, one central element of the movie had the main character be a bastard child. Again, this isn’t bad, but we are now veering more into what is commonly referred to as “adult themes”.

Then we had Wall-E, another film I didn’t care for, but everyone else did (sorry, I refuse to believe that the human race will ever get that bad). This is the film that pushed Pixar into going dark. There were several depressing moments in the movie such as the robot torture scenes and Wall-E dying (and coming back to life…somehow).

Wall-E is Jesus?

I skipped Up, so I can’t fully comment on that film. However, the opening scenes have become wildly known for the developing relationship of the old man and his wife and her death. This was a movie for kids, right?

In 2010, Pixar went back into the well to bring us Toy Story 3. It wasn’t a bad film, but mostly uninspired. The previous two Toy Story films got it right on how to make a kid movie that adults will love too. For the most part, TS3 did this, but for some unknown reason, the climax of the film got really, really dark where we thought the toys were going to be killed (even the characters were accepting their demise!). This was just too dark for a Toy Story film. There is nothing wrong with having characters in a kid movie face peril, but this sequence went on a bit too long making it uncomfortable.

This year, we are treated to another sequel in the form of Cars 2 (I never knew the first Cars was that much of a success). I haven’t seen it, but from the reports I am reading online, this film features, in addition to a needlessly complex plot (which parents are claiming their child didn’t know what was going on), a sequence where the characters are brutality tortured. What?

She loves this show!

This brings us to Brave. The tease trailer is unlike any previous Pixar film trailer before it. All the others have featured some goofy fun shtick from the main character. This one here is dark and forbidding. If I had a young child (and, as far as I know, I don’t), I would be hesitant to take him or her to see it. At least Pixar seems to be upfront about it this time.

Don’t get me wrong.  I am not saying that Pixar needs to pander to the lowest common denominator.  And I appreciate that Pixar is trying to spread its wings and try different things. That is what makes them great.  However, they need to find that balance again.  I just await the day they go back to making movies designed for children which adults can also enjoy, especially when their main competitors at DreamWorks seem to have found that balance with their recent outings.

I’m also getting slightly irritated with the continuing theme in the Pixar movies of “corporations who try to sell you things are bad” given that Pixar itself is a corporation who tries to sell us things. But that’s another post.

~N~

I saw Sanctum in 3D

I recently caught Sanctum in 3D. Do you remember Sanctum? I’m not sure many people do, though I did find it worth checking out. The 3D effects are pretty good (definitely above average) which makes sense being that they were filmed with the same technology James Cameron used to film Avatar (Cameron gets producer credit here). The underwater scenery is pretty spectacular as well. This is probably the best underwater stuff filmed since The Abyss.

Keep in mind this is not a great film by any stretch of the imagination; it is merely in the average to good range. The lead performances, other than fantastic Australian actor Richard Roxburgh, are very hit and miss. For example, Rhys Wakefield, who plays Roxburgh’s son, gives a pretty awful performance. He can’t do much besides show the extreme sides of emotions like anger and sadness. Ioan Gruffud is similarly bad. He isn’t asked to do much more than give a cocky rich-boy performance but can’t quite do that properly.

The story is also all over the place, at least until the action gets going. There are moments where exposition is delivered over a few clunky lines, and then there are later moments of genuinely good father-son bonding between Roxburgh and Wakefield. The script could definitely have used some fine-tuning, as the story’s second half is much stronger than its opening half. There are some genuine moments of terror presented towards the end, many of which revolve around decreasing levels of oxygen, light, and finally sanity.

I was somewhat expecting this film to ape other under-water or otherwise subterranean films, like The Cave and The Descent. But it really doesn’t do that at all. The underwater scenes are fairly artfully filmed as well as competently directed. One scene, involved a collapsed cavern and a Japanese tank, is a marvel to watch. Sanctum begins in a fairly cliched, nondescript manner. However, it ends up being a decent film with some great special effects mixed in. By no means is it fantastic, but in its own way it occasionally flashes brilliance.

-Z-

The Facebook!

Hi everyone. Don’t you just love our insightfulness of our blog posts and hi-jinks of our podcasts*? Now, get up-to-the-minute status reports about our cut-rate production by fanning us on Facebook!

I’m going to try to get a like “Like” box up on the sidebar shortly.

~N~

*podcasts coming soon….full of hi-jinks!

Rediscovering Shocking Asia and Other Musings

Over the weekend my girlfriend and I decided to watch Shocking Asia, the 1974 Mondo-style exploitation documentary. I had not seen this staple of my high school years since the early 00s when our local Video Update/Movie Gallery closed its doors. Video Update was the best rental joint in town because of their large selection of exploitation documentaries, and Shocking Asia was the best on the shelf.

I have long been a fan of exploitation documentaries. I grew up in the 80s, but was unaware of film franchises like Faces of Death and its spiritual successor Traces of Death until the mid-90s. I was still young and naive enough at that time to buy into these films completely, taking what was on screen totally literally and not for once questioning what I was watching. It was only later that I realized just how fake these films were; that they were created solely to shock and captivate audiences with their macabre humor and gratuitous, exploitative sex and violence.

In 2011 it’s harder to be shocking than ever. The internet has desensitized our culture so much that what used to pass for shocking is now just passe. Teenage crime, pedophile pastors, congressional sexual shenanigans — these are just par for the course in our society. In 1974, Rolf Olsen’s film may have shocked the crap out of audiences. Even in 1999, the year I first saw it, Shocking Asia sure had its fair share of shocks remaining.

The film stands as a paean to a simpler time; a time when you couldn’t just Google something or look up a film via Wikipedia. It was a time when experts existed and you needed that weird guy in the corner with an encyclopedic knowledge of cult cinema. Now anyone can just use imdb to find anything out about an upcoming film. The first thing that mainstream internet did for pop culture was turn everyone into a film critic; now it’s turning us all into film experts and historians.

I’m glad the internet exists; without it I wouldn’t be able to blog my thoughts, read hundreds of movie reviews, and watch things like Shocking Asia instantly. But wouldn’t it also be nice to walk into a film knowing nothing at all about it? Even with the recent case of Super 8, I went in virtually knowing nothing except it was a Spielberg production and a JJ Abrams film. It was a total breath of fresh air for me.

It’s hard to be a part of a world where everyone is an armchair quarterback, second-guessing film makers, audiences, and critics all of the time. It’s nice to have this information available at your fingertips, but it’s also nice to get shocked once in a while too.

-Z-

Why I’m Not Going to See Green Lantern This Weekend

Last week I wrote up a list of reasons why I’d be seeing Super 8 on opening weekend. As it turns out, my instincts to get my ass to the theater in that case were correct. I enjoyed Super 8 immensely and I would advise anyone to check it out while it’s in theaters. This week, I am staying home rather than attending the latest comic book movie, Green Lantern.

I was originally going to see this, and in stunning 3D! I changed my mind today when I got a text from my girlfriend that read something like this: “I heard GL is terrible and the 3D is crap. Do we really want to spend our money on it?” I responded back with: “Not really. Let’s just stay home and watch a movie instead.”

I should note that I am a huge Green Lantern fan. I know pretty much everything there is to know about Hal Jordan, Oa, and the history of the Corps. I have scores of comics, graphic novels, and pieces of GL merchandise; I even contemplated getting the GL symbol as a tattoo. I’m a comic-book geek at heart, I suppose. So why the change of heart on the upcoming movie?

1. The reviews are universally bad. IGN, in its review, even compares Green Lantern to last summer’s mega-bomb Jonah Hex. After great reviews for Thor and X-Men: First Class, this is especially disappointing. If it had scored even as well as the recent Hulk movie, then maybe that would have played into my decision. As it stands, the movie seems like a giant green-shaded turd. After a litany of well-reviewed comic book movies, this is a damn shame.

2. DC hasn’t learned their lesson from Superman Returns. That lesson being the following: Stop woefully miscasting your leads! Reynolds seems like he would kind of work as Hal Jordan, but Blake Lively, at 23 years old, has no business being the love interest of a 34 year old man. Just like Kate Bosworth in Superman Returns, Warner Bros. should have cast a much older, much more mature female protagonist. The casting of Lively seems to be the result of some kind of demographic-pandering nightmare.

3. It’ll be on home video in September or October. Why would I waste over $20 on two 3D-surcharged tickets when I can rent it from the Redbox or even watch it on Amazon’s on-demand service in 3 months for less than a value meal at McDonald’s? This is huge problem facing modern Hollywood, and if they want to combat it then they should start providing more quality entertainment. The novelty of 3D  getting more people in the theaters has almost completely worn off. I can watch this movie on my 3D tv at home for a fraction of the price and get the exact same experience without having to suffer idiots yelling at the screen and teenage girls checking their cellphones every 5 minutes.

Are you going to sit through Green Lantern this weekend? Let us know!

-Z-

Super 8 Review

JJ Abram’s latest feature film Super 8 is his first original directorial credit. Despite this, the film certainly feels like it could have existed in the early to mid 80s alongside such films as E.T., Gremlins, and Goonies. Steven Spielberg, who had a hand in each of those films, produces here. It is highly evident that Abrams adores 1980s Steven Spielberg as Super 8 is filled with homage, both visual and emotional, to these films.

Despite feeling like it was made in 1982, Super 8 is an incredible movie in 2011. The direction is subtle, the acting commendable, and the script wonderful. Set in summer 1979, Super 8 follows young Joe (Joel Courtney) as he witnesses a massive train derailment while making a monster movie with his friends. Mysterious happenings occur in their small Ohio town after the derailment, including dogs fleeing the county, appliances gone missing, and electrical shortages randomly occurring.

The film takes place primarily in the aftermath of the train disaster. Joe’s father, Jackson (ably played by Kyle Chandler), takes over the duties of the sheriff after the town’s sheriff goes missing. The best scenes are the panic in the town, as the townspeople grow more and more aware of the mysterious circumstances surrounding the derailment and as government soldiers, led by Noah Emmerich in a surprisingly menacing performance, storm in, barking orders and covering up what governmental secrets they can.

All throughout the kids continue their movie, utilizing the chaos in their small town and calling it “production values.” Joe forms a strong bond with neighborhood girl Alice (Elle Fanning, who is magnificent), who joins the cast of the amateur film and goes on daily adventures with the boys. The coming of age stuff is great; Joe’s relationship with Alice is both subtle and believable. Alice’s father, played character actor Ron Eldard, is at odds with Joe’s father, which gives a star-crossed tinge to the friendship between the boy and the girl. This situation is a tad underwritten, but is not the primary focus of their relationship, thankfully.

I will not give away any of the major secrets of the film. I wholeheartedly recommend seeing this in the theaters. In an earlier blog post, I lamented the fact that Hollywood hasn’t much to offer the consumer this summer. Super 8 is a marvelous film that should be supported. It is very nice to see a movie that doesn’t have the entire plot given away in the trailer. JJ Abrams continues his streak of solid films. Even if this isn’t an established picture, anyone who grew up watching Steven Spielberg films in the mid to late 80s will find something enjoyable here.

Why I’m going to see Super 8 this weekend…

Super 8 is a film that intrigues me. It also happens to be opening this very week. I’m going on Sunday with my girlfriend and her nephew to see it. Here are a few reasons why:

1. JJ Abrams directed it. JJ Abrams made himself known through the medium of television before moving into the film industry. He created or helped create Felicity, Alias, and LOST. His film directing credits are for Mission: Impossible 3 and the excellent Star Trek reboot. Thus far, Abrams has a pretty stellar career hit-to-miss ratio.

2. It’s secrets are just that… secrets! There is some kind of monster in this film, but I have no idea what it looks like, whether it’s friendly or menacing, or whether it’s terrestrial or alien in nature. I don’t know this because the trailers have not given it away. I really appreciate that Abrams and crew did not want their secrets being given away in the trailers.

3. It’s a very Spielbergian film from when Spielberg was king. Super 8 calls back to the days of Jaws, Gremlins, Close Encounters, E.T., Back to the Future, and many other Spielberg-directed and -produced products of the late-70s to the mid-80s. Having grown up in the late-80s watching The Goonies every Thanksgiving, I have a certain amount of nostalgia for this time period. Judging from the look of the characters in the trailers, Abrams is very true to the look and feel of America in the late-70s and early-80s.

4. None of the actors in it are particularly “known.” The two biggest names are Kyle Chandler and Ron Eldard, two fairly established actors who are in no way big stars. This means there is no awkward Tom Cruise performance where we are expected to believe he’s a maintenance man or electrician or something. It helps keep the film at a level of reality that other Hollywood summer blockbusters just can’t match.

Are you going to see Super 8 this weekend? Why or why not?

-Z-

It’s been a week, so why not write an article on 3D?

Last week I bought a 3d tv. I didn’t necessarily need a new tv. The sound is going out on my old one and it has this weird error when you turn it on, but by and large it still works. I didn’t except to be a new tv either, let alone a newfangled 3d monstrosity. But I did anyway. Here’s how it happened:

I was in Best Buy last weekend with my girlfriend. We decided to go out for a nice steak dinner for her birthday, and Best Buy was a good way to spend an hour or so when you need to kill some time walking around until you’re ready to eat. Now whenever I go to Best Buy, I like to walk by the super expensive televisions and price them. Prices have steadily declined, based on my observations, over the past 5 years on HDTVs. I bought a 40″ Dynex HDTV from Best Buy in 2008 for just over $500. That same tv (albeit a newer model) is available now for a paltry $350.

The clerk asked us if we’d like to check out some of the 3d tvs. I am not opposed to viewing things in 3d. I loved Avatar in 3d. I also enjoyed Tron Legacy and Coraline. A few movies, notably 2009’s Ice Age sequel, did not transfer well. But by and large I am not a detractor of the technology. I’m also interested in 3d gaming, as it seems Sony is pushing it heavily (and Uncharted 3 is going to look amazing in 3d). We tried it out, and were both pretty impressed over all with technology.

Best Buy had a 2009 46″ 3d capable Bravia available at a huge clearance price, and while I declined initially, I thought about it over dinner and then during some birthday shopping. “The sound on my old tv is horrible,” I thought. “I just got a new job and this is a nice reward,” I thought. Even my normally-frugal girlfriend thought I should heavily consider it. So I pulled the trigger and bought it, along with two pair of glasses (rechargeable!) and a copy of Tron Legacy in 3d.

It’s really fantastic, honestly. The picture is beautiful as well. I haven’t messed around with the 3d all that much yet, but I definitely love Super Stardust HD on PS3 in 3d. It looks so crisp and clear. It was pretty late, so we just fired up a scene from Tron Legacy and basked in its 3d glory. I noticed a few of my full-length videogames are 3d as well (notably Killzone 3 and Crysis 2). I’m totally geared up to play through them again. This weekend we’ll watch all of Tron Legacy as well and I’m super psyched about that. Basically any excuse I can come up with to watch my tv I’m all over.

So should you buy a 3d television set? I don’t know; it depends on how you feel about the technology. At this point I don’t think it’s going away. This summer alone has something like a dozen movies premiering in the third dimension. I wouldn’t have bought a new tv if it weren’t at a massive discount, that’s for sure. I guess just a combination of timing and good fortune brought me and my 3d tv together.

-Z-

Why don’t we expect more from our summer entertainment?

In the last decade or so it seems Hollywood is content to unleash sequel after sequel after sequel onto the populace each summer. Throw in the occasional remake (Why remake Fright Night or Karate Kid when the original is already good?) and it seems summer is filled with no new ideas, retreads of characters, and a total lack of originality.

Summer of 2007 is oft cited (by me) as the low point of this standard. That summer alone saw Spiderman 3, Pirates 3 (released less than a year after Pirates 2), Harry Potter 216, and Shrek Part 3: Shrek Farts Out Another 600 Million Dollars. Each of these films seemed to last in excess of two and a half hours, were bloated by extemporaneous characters, dialogue, and product placement and also seemed to have a collective score of 6 on Metacritic.

Summer of 2011 is shaping up to be 2007 all over again. We’ve already had Pirates 4 unleashed upon our sensibilities. Hangover 2 opened just this past weekend and seems to be the same exact movie with nothing more than a location change. X-Men: First Class opens soon, and based on the positive reviews it might actually be good. But it’s still the 5^th X-Movie in 11 years and it just seems so unnecessary at this point. Kung-Fu Panda 2 and Cars 2 should be good enough entertainment for the kids but damn do they seem inconsequential. Harry Potter finally goes away this summer, which is exciting but not exciting enough to get me into a theater. The aforementioned Fright Night remake will be released in August. Let’s hope McLovin won’t have to do porn for the rest of his career if the movie bombs.

In Summer of 2008, Paramount Pictures helped release Iron Man, a comic-book movie that seemed to re-write the rules of comic book movies. It was fresh and fun, helped by a great performance from Robert Downey Junior. Though little more than an origin story, audiences responded exceedingly positively to the movie. 2009 saw District 9, perhaps the smartest mainstream science fiction film of the decade. Last year, Christopher Nolan released the intelligent blockbuster Inception, a film that challenged audiences to actually think about what was going on, but also managed to be a gigantic hit at the same time. What summer film released in 2011 will do the same?

Thor received some positive buzz, but it hasn’t exactly broken out the way Iron Man did. Green Lantern looks absolutely atrocious, which is disappointing considering the rise in popularity of the source material as well as the director involved (Martin Campbell, of Casino Royale fame). Captain America seems like a pretty safe bet, but it too seems to fall more into the Thor range rather than the Iron Man range (though I personally think it looks good). That honestly leaves me with Super 8 and Cowboys & Aliens to get excited over. This summer just ain’t looking too good…

-Z-