Second Look - Toy Story 2

Note: This review contains spoilers for Toy Story 1 and 2.

Following the success of the original Toy Story film, Disney desired to capitalize on it with a sequel, developing one themselves for the direct-to-video market. When the project, Toy Story 2, was upgraded to a theatrical release, Pixar were unsatisfied with what had been made and were given permission to overhaul it themselves, but they only had nine months to do the whole thing due to Disney not wanting to budge on the 1999 release date. While I was too young to see the original Toy Story when it first came out in a theater, I was old enough to see Toy Story 2 this way, and many of its themes and contributions to Toy Story canon stuck with me well into adulthood. Looking back on it, where the original Toy Story has held up as a timeless classic, Toy Story 2 has managed to solidify itself as another classic in its own right thanks to its strong writing and well-handled themes.

Second Opinion - Toy Story

Note: This review contains spoilers for Toy Story.

Back in 1995, years before the studio tied the knot with Disney, Pixar made history with Toy Story, the first ever completely CGI animated film. Its impact on the animation industry, for better or worse, cannot be understated, as it revolutionized the medium and opened up more of its potential. The most impressive thing about the film, however, isn’t that it spawned an ongoing multimedia franchise or made a lasting mark on pop culture through iconic characters and moments, but that even over 30 years later, despite the animation showing its age, it still holds up as one of the studio’s best films and among the best that the medium has to offer.

Ratatouille

 

While Pixar had a sort of “Golden Age”, that being the time between Toy Story (1995) and Toy Story 3 (2010), these films didn’t necessarily come without struggle. Such was the case for Ratatouille, the studio’s eight feature, which saw Brad Bird take over as writer and director after the original creator, Jan Pinkava, left Pixar during the film’s early development. After about two years of work, which included story rewrites and extensive research into cooking and Parisian culture, the film saw the light of day in 2007 to critical acclaim, successful box office returns and the Academy Award for Best Animted Feature (beating out Persepolis and Surf’s Up). Today, Ratatouille remains not only a classic animated film, but an enjoyable celebration of the joy of creation, particularly through the power of cooking.

Second Look - Super Mario Bros. (Film)

For the longest time, most live-action video game movies haven’t been of the best quality, though the first of them, the infamous 1993 Super Mario Bros. film, didn’t really set a good precedent, mainly due to how little it resembles the source material. While more recent efforts have been getting better, it can be interesting to look back on this film to see what went wrong, and with the release of the more faithful animated film, now is as good a time as any. While I had been wanting to re-review this film anyway since I was not completely satisfied with my first attempt, it has become much harder to do so, at least if you live in the US, since it cannot be streamed anywhere and the more recent Blu-ray release has become more difficult to come by. Fortunately, it is still possible to get a cheap DVD copy, which allowed me to watch the movie again with fresher eyes after having not seen it in over a decade. Unfortunately, it’s still not that great of a movie even on its own merits, although it’s easier to see why it has attracted a cult following in the 30 years since its release.

Oliver & Company

 

Following the financial failure of The Black Cauldron, Disney CEO Michael Eisner and Chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg invited Disney animators to pitch ideas for future animated features. Among the many pitches, story artist Pete Young suggested “Oliver Twist with dogs”, which manifested in 1988 as Oliver & Company, the final film in Disney’s “Dark Age” of animation. Although critics had a divisive reaction on release, it still did very well enough at the box office, making an estimated $121 million against a budget of $31 million, enough that justified Katzenberg’s mandated yearly release schedule.

In the years since its original release, Oliver & Company has also gained a cult following, much like other overlooked Disney films like Treasure Planet or Atlantis: The Lost Empire. One key factor in this film receiving comparatively little attention, however, may be that it came out only one year before Disney’s take on The Little Mermaid, which kicked off the Disney Renaissance. Regardless, there are plenty of things to like about Oliver & Company that make it worth watching it today, even if the finished product is far from perfect.

101 Dalmatians (1996)

Note: This review contains spoilers for 101 Dalmatians (1961) and 101 Dalmatians (1996).

Long before Disney’s current stream of unnecessary live-action remakes, they had dabbled in a scant few. One of these was 101 Dalmatians, the 1996 remake of the 1961 animated classic One Hundred and One Dalmatians. Although this remake evidently did well enough to spawn a sequel, 102 Dalmatians, critics weren’t too fond of it, at least according to the 41% Rotten rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which calls it as a “bland and pointless remake” in the critic consensus. Among many other films from the 90s, the live-action 101 Dalmatians is one that I have a vague memory of watching as a young child, but no real memory of the actual content. After watching the original animated film again not too long ago, I felt more in the mood to give the remake a real watch and, to my surprise, it was a bit better than I thought it would be.

Hercules (1997)

Note: This review contains spoilers for Hercules (1997).

Towards the end of the Disney Renaissance, Disney released their 35th animated feature, Hercules, to good reviews from critics, but underperformed at the box office, especially in comparison to the Disney films that came before it. At the same time, the liberties taken with Greek mythology, especially the Hercules myths on which the film is based, angered Greece enough that the film didn’t have its planned premiere in the country. As a kid at the time, however, I was completely unaware of this and only remember watching it through someone else’s VHS copy, though only certain parts of the film stuck with me. Growing up, however, I got more familiar with the different elements of the film through the heavy representation in the Kingdom Hearts series until, eventually, I finally rewatched the film in time for its 25th anniversary. While I can see now how it’s not that great as an adaptation of the Hercules myth, I did still find it a great film in its own right.

Cars

Note: The review contains spoilers for Cars.

When you start off good and you’ve been practicing your craft long enough, you are likely to have at least one weak point somewhere in your career. In the case of Pixar, their first arguably weak movie in their catalog was the original Cars film in 2006. When I saw the first trailer in front of The Incredibles in a theater, I will admit the concept of basing a movie around a world of anthropomorphic vehicles was baffling to me, however I watched it anyway out of my loyalty to Pixar, finding it surprisingly average for them at the time and their weakest film until Cars 2 came out in 2011. In the 15 years since, I have only watched Cars again sparingly, however I recently decided to give it a closer look to see how well it held up when compared to its sequels. Though I generally enjoyed it, it’s still not exactly one of Pixar’s better movies.

A Goofy Movie

Note: This review contains spoilers for A Goofy Movie.

While there are many motivations to watch a film, as we’ve discussed before on this blog, sometimes you’ve seen a film during childhood, but either didn’t pay attention or memories of it faded until you’re reminded of its existence years later. This was the case with A Goofy Movie, an animated Disney film based on Goof Troop that turned 25 this year. While looking for something short to watch, I remembered wanting to watch A Goofy Movie while actually paying attention to the plot, which led to buying a cheap DVD copy. At the next opportunity, I finally gave it a watch and realized I had just seen an underrated Disney classic.