I Love Lamp

Around 2005, I had a pang of sadness. George Lucas had released Episode III and the Matrix and Lord Of The Ring trilogies had finished 2 years prior. There was nothing cinematic left to look forward to. (In hindsight, it's a good thing that Lucas stopped at that third prequel and didn't go on to make the much hinted-at 3 sequels which would follow Return Of The Jedi - although we can live in fear everyday).

Anyway, my point is that although excellent films come along all the time (has anyone seen the most excellent French thriller Tell No One yet? C'est superbe!), there were no franchises left to plunder. In 2005, I was looking forward to Bryan Singer reigniting the Superman films but instead he made them drastically worse by introducing a new character which will inevitably plague any future films. And even though I knew a new Batman film (...Begins) was imminent, who would have thought it would go to become the new benchmark for comic-book movies and origin stories?

So, all the way through this period - and back to 1995 even - there's been one source of filmaking that is (almost) sure to hit the spot every time: Pixar Animation Studios in Emeryville, California.

My fondness for Pixar started somewhere following the release of Toy Story. I used to watch the film endlessly at university, stunned not at the quality of the computer animation, but at the depth of the characters and the inventiveness of the plot. In hindsight - and in comparison with later work by the studio - there are faults with the animation: the humans aren't quite right, and everything has a glossy Star Trek-sheen as though it was (surprise surprise) created inside a computer. But the story has charm and it is this that has held the film in high regard for the last 15 years.





















Although I think A Bug's Life is a fine film, it is probably one of the weaker Pixar films - mainly because of the massive debt it owes to The Seven Samurai / The Magnificent Seven - but also it was a poor contender to Antz, which was released by Dreamworks at the same time.

Things got back on track a year later with the sequel to Toy Story - and the first of many Pixar films I would catch on the big screen. The animation is far improved from the original - just check out the fantastic opening 10 minutes - and they finally managed to get human beings looking a little less like a random assortment of geometric shapes.

Monsters Inc., released in 2001 remains one of my favourite films from the studio. It's the first of many Pixar releases that seems to be aimed more at adults than children - and considering I don't have the innocent mind of a 5-year old any more, that can only be a good thing. Again, it's the characterisation - and the interplay between the two leads - which pulls the film out of family-friendly cartoon territory and into comedic genius.

2003's Finding Nemo marks the first time the studio won the Best Animated Feature at the Academy Awards. Although not a favourite of mine - mainly because of how child-friendly it is - there are some magnificent moments, and it looks amazing. But it is 2004's The Incredibles where Pixar really hits its stride.

Right from the trailer - which makes use of John Barry's On Her Majesty's Secret Service theme - the ingredients are perfect: a bunch of superheroes in hiding (à la Watchmen), a megalomaniacal villain encamped on an island hideaway (à la You Only Live Twice), an Art Deco design scheme, a John Barry-esque soundtrack, and a satirical edge so sharp it demands a second viewing just to digest it all.

The Incredibles was the second Pixar film to scoop the Best Animated Feature award and marks the first time a Pixar film was written and directed by an outsider. Brad Bird's touch takes the focus away from the whimsy of John Lasseter and Andrew Stanton and thankfully there's no Randy Newman songs to sour the deal either.

Of course, when you're at the top there's only one way to go, and that's down. 2006's Cars is a definite low. There's pretty much nothing going on here to keep anybody's attention, and the fact that the central character is so obsessed with money and celebrity is a really odd choice for a children's film. The same can be said of Shark Tale, Dreamworks' 2004 attempt to ape Finding Nemo. I understand that it's all about the journey, and that the message is 'friends before fame', but when you consider that most children would see a character only in the way that they are introduced, what does this teach them? Of course, it works perfectly when you look at the culture we live in: American Idol, The X-Factor, Big Brother, Britain's/America's Got Talent, and so on and so forth. Simon Fuller has a lot to answer for.

Unfortunately things manage to slip further downhill with Ratatouille, released in 2007. There's just something very un-Pixar about this film. I had high hopes, with Brad Bird returning to the fold, but it just stinks of Disney. Perhaps I need to revisit it - it won Pixar their third Best Animated Feature award, and it seems to be universally lauded everywhere else.

WALL-E, released in 2008, represents the closest Pixar has come to a nomination for the Best Picture category. Advised on lighting and atmosphere by Roger Deakins and Dennis Muren, the film looks scarily realistic, especially in the scenes on Earth in the first act. Given that it's a cartoon, the fact that certain shots that look like the real world is a testament to how far the animation has come since the very smooth-looking Toy Story days.

Another impressive feat is that WALL-E is practically a silent movie for the first half - a bold move from a studio which usually puts so much stock in the quality of its scripts. Most of all however, the one thing that makes the film truly deserving as the studio's fourth Best Animated Feature is the fact that there is more emotion and interplay between the two leads - a couple of robots - than there is in a year's worth of formulaic Hollywood bullshit.

I haven't seen Up yet, and given New Zealand's whacky release schedule, I doubt that I'll see it anytime soon. But I can't wait. It doesn't look to be aimed at children, considering that it revolves around the adventures of an old man, so that's good - and it's in 3D which I'm also looking forward to. I can't speak for a proper live-action film in 3D as I haven't had the pleasure, but an animated film is the perfect medium for it - Monsters Vs. Aliens looked amazing recently.

So that concludes the Pixar story so far. I recently read that the studio is about to start moving into live-action filmmaking, which I suppose shouldn't be seen as a surprise given the few glimpses of it we saw in WALL-E, but it makes me wonder why they would venture into a field that has been tried and tested? Pixar spearheaded computer animation so I would like to see them move into unkown territory again.

There's also a rumour that the studio will be shooting a remake of Star Trek III: The Search For Spock. It will be called Finding Nimoy.

EPILOGUE: THE SHORTS
One of the best things about seeing a Pixar film at the cinema is that you get the full experience of a short film, followed by the main feature. This is excellent as the shorts are always high on laughs and are usually just as good as the films that follow them. Given their length, they're a really good thing to have on your iPod too.
I'm not going to list every one, but here are my favourite 3:
For The Birds - a silent film, backed by some nice jazz, about a group of birds on a telephone wire. Shown prior to Monsters, Inc.
Lifted - a dark sci-fi piece following a training session of an alien spaceship as it attempts to do a spot of midnight abducting. Shown prior to Ratatouille.
Presto - a hungry rabbit and an intolerant stage magician do battle on stage over a carrot. Shown prior to WALL-E.

And finally, I can heartily recommend The Pixar Story - a feature length documentary by Leslie Iwerks, which can be found on the special features of the WALL-E DVD.