3D
Woody and co are back with a bang in the final instalment of the Toy Story ‘saga’.
Woody and co are back with a bang in the final instalment of the Toy Story ‘saga’. A decade has passed since their last outing and our plastic friends show no signs of gathering dust.
Pixar delivers a fresh, funny finale to a franchise which has captured the imagination of adults and children alike since its inception in 1995.
The action picks up with Andy heading off to college. Woody, Buzz and the rest of the gang, in need of a new home, find a fresh start in the Sunnyside daycare centre. It quickly becomes apparent that the seemingly idyllic nursery isn’t all that its cracked up to be.
Director Lee Unkrich handles the obligatory setup well, filling in the years gone by and setting up the action which follows.
Things really get underway though, when we enter the Sunnyside daycare centre. Perfect pacing follows thereafter, with a prison-break theme providing genuinely funny, moving and scary moments.
Elements of film-noir also break through the screen, adding an occasionally sinister tinge.
Toy Story 3 is the most mature in the series. That’s not to say it isn’t funny. It’ll leave you with more stitches than a drunken doctor. What really impressed me though was Unkrich’s ability to seamlessly blend humour with darker adult themes.
Cut in the mould of traditional children’s literature, Toy Story 3 touches on issues of abandonment, death and the circle of life.
An additional layer of poignancy is added by way of the fact that many of the viewers who started watching the franchise back in 1995 are now grown up themselves. It’s a kind of existential parallel between audience and film which really drives the key messages home.
Toy Story 3 cements the series as one of the greatest movie franchises of all time. The perfect trilogy is a rare, if non-existent thing.
Pixar insists this is the gang’s final adventure, but as the saying goes: in Hollywood, money talks.
So don’t be surprised if Woody and co spring forth from the toy box in the future. Let’s hope not though – some things are just perfect as they are.
On 09-09-09, the movie 9 came out. It’s about a bunch of little mechanical rag doll-looking characters that roam around a post-war earth where battles between humans and robots resulted in the destruction of humanity. Shane Acker, the director of the film, created 9 from a short film he made as a UCLA student.
Visually, this is probably one of the best looking CG animated feature film I’ve seen in a while. It’s about time an animated CG feature strayed away from the "plastic" shaders that is overly used by Pixar and DreamWorks. It’s been over 10 years since Toy Story came out and Pixar/DreamWorks are still giving us CG movies that look like those little toys. Fortunately, the movie 9 has the balls to try something visually new, at least in terms of the mainstream CG feature length films. If you like Blur Studios’ game cinematics, you’ll love the imagery in 9. Tim Burton’s producing role on this film seemed to influence some of the character’s and environment’s designs. Simply put, you can see the “Burton Style” that is seen in Nightmare before Christmas and James and the Giant Peach. It has dark hues, Goth, simple designs, great detail mixed with old school Disney charms.
The plot was good in the beginning of the movie when there’s a lot of discovery and suspense. However, by the end, it was a little dissatisfying as the main character doesn’t seem to grow at all. Throughout the movie, the audience is presented with two main viewpoints on how to live life by either curiosity or fear. We’re supposed to cheer for curiosity, but I thought the character who was supposed to be afraid was simply being cautious. In the end, some characters learn facts, but what fun is knowledge without “more” friends to share them with? Still, it’s a good watch.
Rating: GOODNESS
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