After viewing the excellent documentary The Pixar Story on the Starz network, not to mention their magnificent new release Wall-E in theaters, I thought I would briefly comment on the astonishing creative and commercial success of Pixar Animation Studios. Starting in 1979 doing work for Lucasfilm, and subsequently forming partnerships with Apple founder Steve Jobs as well as Disney, Pixar has become the undisputed king of animation over the last decade or so. Beginning with 1995's Toy Story (the first full-length computer-animated film), Pixar has since had an unparalleled string of hits, with every film they've made taking in a ton of money and collecting a few Academy Awards along the way. Not only that, but they've managed to do so by coming up with completely original ideas for each film and continuing to put quality at the forefront.That's really the most remarkable part; that, after 9 films, they haven't stumbled once creatively. It says something that their worst film by far is Cars, and even that is pretty solid entertainment. So how do they continue to keep churning out great film after great film? There's probably a large amount of luck involved, but a reasonable theory would be that every single person involved in the film making process on both the creative and technological side seems to be committed to raising the bar with every film they make. Every film is consistently entertaining and funny with eye-popping visuals, but those factors always exist to serve the story, instead of the other way around. The story is always the most important factor in their films and is perfected first, with great characterizations and smart social commentary that organically rise from it. Whether tackling issues like loneliness and identity (Toy Story 1 & 2), satirizing mass consumerism and pollution (Wall-E), or skewering society's "everyone is special" attitude (The Incredibles), Pixar has always managed to subtly embed intelligence and heart into their films, without ever being too schmaltzy or overbearing. Also gotta love the occasional references to great films like The Seven Samurai (in A Bug's Life) or 2001: A Space Odyssey (in Wall-E). The strength of their stories has also meant they've never had to resort to snark and pop-culture references for humor like so many lesser animated films have. The voice work they've hired has also been inspired, avoiding celebrity stunt-casting. They certainly use many big-time names (Tom Hanks, Kevin Spacey, Billy Crystal, etc.), but always in roles that they are right for, and they often use lesser known actors in main roles (Patton Oswalt, Lou Romano, Sarah Vowell). This winning formula has been successful regardless of the director they use, whether they are homegrown Pixar employees, like Andrew Stanton or studio co-founder John Lasseter; or outside talent, like Brad Bird. It's stunning, really, that they've been able maintain such an incredible streak, and I will continue to look forward to whatever instant classic Pixar puts out next.
For fun, below I've ranked all of the Pixar films in order of my preference, with ratings for each. This was extremely difficult for me, as tomorrow I could easily mix up the entire top 5 at random and still feel okay about it. That's how good they are. Love to hear all your opinions too.
1. Toy Story 2 (1999, d. John Lasseter) Grade: A
2. Wall-E (2008, d. Andrew Stanton) A
3. The Incredibles (2004, d. Brad Bird) A
4. Toy Story (1995, d. Lasseter) A
5. Ratatouille (2007, d. Bird) A
6. Finding Nemo (2003, d. Stanton) A-
7. A Bug's Life (1998, d. Lasseter) A-
8. Monsters, Inc. (2001, d. Pete Docter) A-
9. Cars (2006, d. Lasseter) B
2 comments:
Pixar, without a doubt, is the reason why animated films should be considered for best picture. The fact that there is a separate category for animated films, in my opinion, is an insult to the king of family films. I'm also impressed that with all their success, they've only done one sequel. Any other company would milk each and every success. It just goes to show that there's so much originality in the company (with plenty more to go, I'm sure) that they don't have to.
Right now, Wall-E is my number one and I would definitely put the original Pixar film, Toy Story, ahead of its sequel.
In all fairness, all animated movies are still eligible for the Best Picture Oscar, despite the Animated Feature category. That category only came into existence in 2001, and only 1 animated film in history (Beauty and the Beast, 1991) has been nominated for Best Pic. It's just the Academy's overall reluctance to nominate a "cartoon" for the big prize. The bad thing about the Animated Feature category is that it gives them another excuse not to nominate a great film like Wall-E for Best Pic, because they'll feel like the Animated Oscar is reward enough, and that's total crap. Hopefully the Academy will see past that this year, because no matter what else comes out this year, Wall-E will likely be one of my top 5 favorite films.
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