Opinion Battles Round 15
Favourite Pixar Movie
With Finding Dory finally making it to England it is time to go into Pixar’s back category and pick our favorite of the company’s short history. They have broken our hearts over and over again bringing tears to our eyes many times.
If you want to take part in the next round of Opinion Battles we are celebrating the release of Suicide Squad by looking at our favorite villains from a Batman movie, the closing date is 6th August 2016 and email your choices to [email protected]
Darren – Movie Reviews 101
Toy Story 3
Toy Story 3 is the third chapter of the adventures of Woody and Buzz Lightyear who find themselves in the day care center because Andy has reached college age. The fact this film represents the stage of life where we move on and will no longer need toys in our lives with the final scene where Andy passes the toys over to a good kid breaks the hearts because the future is a place where we and Andy will not know where things in our lives are going.
Kim – Tranquil Dreams
Up
Up is an amazing imaginative story from its character designs to making us feel love, loss, family and even making our last dreams come true no matter what it takes. You have colorful exotic birds and mechanically voiced dogs, adventurers, boys scouts and an old man then add in a flying house and a millions colorful balloons. It combines the best of Pixar from storytelling to character design to animation all into one lovely bundle. There’s a heartwarming feeling that always flows through me when I watch this one.
Wall-e
My favorite Pixar movie is WALL-E. I have a feeling I may be the only one to choose that one! I expect Toy Story to be the most popular choice and, of course, I love that series like crazy. Monsters, Inc also tops my list. Well, they all do other than Cars & Cars 2 (and The Good Dinosaur – the only Pixar movie I haven’t bothered to watch. I can’t believe I skipped out on a Pixar film).
I’m a massive Pixar fan & think, except for a few rare missteps, they’ve made some absolute masterpieces that are perfect for all ages & better than the majority of live-action Academy Award-winning films being churned out. As they’re animated, I think they’re not always taken seriously. But Inside Out is absolutely brilliant, the beginning of Up is a beautifully powerful piece of filmmaking, and Toy Story & Monsters, Inc are clever & hilarious.
I fully admit that WALL-E isn’t perfect in its entirety. It falls apart in the middle (when the humans show up, to be specific). However, the first part of the film is an absolute masterpiece. And it’s mostly silent! Only Pixar could get away with that. WALL-E’s design is fantastic & those eyes convey more emotion than most real-life actors can manage. The sound design is also perfect (but that’s to be expected from Ben Burtt, also responsible for my favorite Star Wars character: R2-D2). Yes, I’m a sucker for science fiction & I always love an adorable robot so this movie is the exact sort of thing I go for. But the first time I saw WALL-E, when they zoom in to show a lonely robot on Earth & the eerie music kicks in, I knew I was seeing something very special & that it would be unlike any other “kids’ film” I’d seen before. Then we spend a good chunk of the start of the film just watching this cute robot and his Chaplin-esque antics while he silently goes about his work with a cockroach as his only companion. Yep – only Pixar would’ve been granted the approval to go ahead with that opening! And it’s PERFECTION. I’ve watched the beginning of WALL-E so many times now and it never fails to lift my spirits. That’s what I call amazing filmmaking & it’s why I adore Pixar.
Daniel – Dellens 456
Inside Out
Frankly Pixar has many great films, Up, The Toy Story Trilogy and Wall-e are all really good films. But my favorite Pixar film is Inside Out. It is so creative, the animators had to answer what emotions look like. They had nothing to work with but what they did make is a colourful ball of fun. The story is very well played out showing how the emotions’ actions effect Riley’s life. Lewis Black as Anger is so funny and makes the film. All the different places Sadness and Joy go to are so imaginative and the animators finally made cartoony animation in CG look good (I’m talking to you, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs).
Drew – Drew’s Movie Reviews
Toy Story
There are many, many reasons why Toy Story deserves the recognition is regularly gets. For starters, it was the first computer-animated film. I can’t forget to mention the relatable characters or the heartwarming story. But most importantly, it is the very definition of a timeless classic. If you watch it today, it is just as relevant as it was twenty years ago. Sure, the animation might look a little dated but it still looks pretty good, sometimes even better than some of the computer animation being released today. That’s a pretty good feat considering it was the starting point for computer animation. Toy Story is universally loved. I challenge you to find someone who doesn’t like it. I couldn’t watch it enough when I was a kid and that still rings true today. It may be the nostalgia speaking but I think Toy Story isn’t just the best Pixar movie but it is also one of the best animated movies ever made.
Tom – Plain Simple Tom Reviews
Toy Story
Oh come on, it’d be sacrilege to nominate anything else!Co-written by Joss Whedon and co-produced by Steve Jobs, it’s the perfect family film with amazing performances from Tom Hanks and Tim Allen, wonderful supporting characters and beautiful music courtesy of Randy Newman. It’s clever, imaginative, colourful, funny and heart warming, never patronising or condescending and can effortlessly melt the heart of even the grumpiest viewer (that’s me, by the way!)The original. The best.
Rob – Movie Rob
Inside Out
It is so inventive and smart and also tries to make some kind of order out of what potentially goes on in each and every one of our minds. The script is amazingly written and is funny, witty, emotional and ultimately inspiring. This film is disguised as a kid’s movie, but it really isn’t. I have heard from numerous sources (even my own) that kids just don’t even come close to enjoying and understanding what is going on here as adults. The voice cast is superb; Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith, Bill Hader, Lewis Black and Mindy Kaling are all great. (My personal favorite is Black of course). I’ve seen every one of PIXAR’s amazing movies and this one is one of the best because it really hits the nail on the head on so many levels and it spoke to me directly all 3 times I’ve seen it. I am actually reminded about this movie so often, especially every time I look into my 14 month old daughter’s eyes because it makes me wonder what really is going on back there… This movie does a damn fine job attempting to explain it to us.
Rachel – 54 Disney Reviews
Up
My favorite Pixar movie is Up. It is also my favorite movie. I love it for personal reasons, which in my opinion is the best reason to love a film. Whenever I watch it I think about my Grandpa who I miss very much. A lot of people love the start of Up with the amazing life montage of Ellie and Carl but I love the rest of the film too. Up is about a man who is plagued with guilt about the life he wishes he could have given his sweetheart. He’s kind of paralyzed in a way. It is only through the journey of the movie that he realizes Ellie has forgiven him and when he reads her entry in the scrapbook at the end it gets me every time. I tear up even typing about it. I love the artistry of Up and the music is perfect. Christopher Plummer is the villain and the dogs are hilarious. To me it is close to perfection. I love the spirit of adventure!
Richard – The Humpo Show
Toy story 2
I think I have watched Toy Story 2 about 1,753 times….I absolutely adore the film. The characters, the adventures and the comedy. I could have picked any Toy Story film for my choice, but I went with no. 2, due to the introduction of new characters Jessie and Bullseye. And for the chase scene at the airport alone, the film is undoubtedly one of my favourites!
Emma – Emma Explains It All
Toy Story
I don’t especially love any of the Pixar movies if I’m honest but Toy Story (and Toy Story 2) are pretty good. I toyed with choosing Toy Story 2 instead, I think it’s on a par with the original but the one thing it doesn’t have is Buzz Lightyear believing he’s a real space ranger – and that is priceless. It’s not that I dislike the Pixar movies, I don’t at all but I don’t have big firm favourites like I do with Disney or Ghibli.
But I love the characters in Toy Story (especially Buzz) and the music is very good. I think it’s a genuinely funny film as well. Hard to believe it’s more than twenty years old but with Toy Story 4 set for release in 2018, it shows how popular the franchise still is.
Kira – Film and Tv 101
Monsters Inc.
The film that epitomises Pixar for me is Monsters Inc. It’s one of those films that really are for the whole family, and no matter what age you are when you watch it, you can’t help but enjoy it immensely. Monsters Inc. takes all the ingredients of a blockbuster (the unwilling hero, the brilliant villain, etc) and puts them together in a truly universal way that I find never gets old. The colourful animations are stunning and the story is one that is actually quite advanced for what is technically a kids film. In my honest opinion, Pixar will have to go a very long way before they come close to topping this one.
Damien Riley – Riley Central
The Incredibles
The Incredibles is not the highest grossing Pixar film, nor it is the highest rated on Rotten Tomatoes. Still, it had a huge impact on the animation that would follow. Director Brad Bird (The Iron Giant) saw it as an homage to comic books and spy films from his boyhood in the 1960s. Also led by vision, the animators broke new ground with this film. Having an all-human cast required them to create new technology to animate human anatomy, clothing and skin and hair. Although the technical team had some experience with cloth and hair in Monsters, Inc., this was a far higher amount of cloth and hair than in previous movies. Beside the tech savvy, this film has a warmth and sensitivity audiences are drawn to. The story of these superheroes that are literally a family is endearing and makes it alluring. There is no shortage of swashbuckling excitement and adventure either. To me, this film stands out above the rest. It’s a high watermark for Pixar.
S.G. Liput – Rhyme and Reason
Finding nemo
I love Pixar, but who doesn’t? So many of their films have a special emotional meaning to the audience, especially those like me who grew up during Pixar’s heyday, and they especially excel at films that appeal equally to kids and parents alike. While the Toy Story trilogy is slightly higher on my list of top films, I had to go with Finding Nemo. I saw it in the theater, and it had me sobbing within the first five minutes. Not only is Finding Nemo a perfect example of Pixar’s talent for creating lovably quirky characters, from the sharks and turtles met along the way to the Tank Gang in the dentist’s office, but Marlin’s journey across the ocean is the sweetest illustration of a father’s love and devotion on screen. At the time, I was convinced that I would be a marine biologist when I grew up, and though my goals have changed since, I still love fish. Seeing the radiant underwater world that Pixar crafted so beautifully was a true treat for me, and it still is. Plus, it gave us one of the funniest animated characters of all time in Dory, Ellen DeGeneres’ forgetful, whale-speaking blue tang who just got her own movie. Pixar has a long history of excellence, but Finding Nemo is one of their very best.
J – Film & Nuance
Inside Out
There’s nothing quite like Inside Out. While Toy Story may capture the hearts of some (me included), I was more affected by Inside Out as a teen than I was by Toy Story when I was a kid…which says alot. With an innovative storyline and a message rooted in forward-thinking psychology, Inside Out unravels the complexities of the human mind through 11 year-old Riley. The sea of consciousness can be a nebulous and mysterious subject to navigate and it could definitely risk alienating the younger audience. But somehow, it manages to stir up the same amount of enthusiasm in the child and the adult. Because it’s so real and unashmedly raw, I immediately developed a huge connection with the film. I love it for its animation,for its wacky characters,its unique perspective,its metaphors that transcend in fun and relatable ways-But most of all, I love it because it enlightens us on a truth that we find hard to grasp; Sadness is essential for happiness and growth,and therefore,essential for the very fufillment of life itself. This is undoubtedly my favorite Pixar film ever.
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