Inside Out
Composer:
Michael GiacchinoCast:
Diane Lane, Amy Poehler, Mindy Kaling, Bill Hader, Kyle MacLachlan, Phyllis Smith, Lewis Black, Richard Kind, Jess Harnell, Carlos Alazraqui, Frank Oz (more)VOD (3)
Plots(1)
Growing up can be a bumpy road, and it's no exception for Riley, who is uprooted from her Midwest life when her father starts a new job in San Francisco. Like all of us, Riley is guided by her emotions - Joy, Fear, Anger, Disgust and Sadness. The emotions live in Headquarters, the control center inside Riley's mind, where they help advise her through everyday life. As Riley and her emotions struggle to adjust to a new life in San Francisco, turmoil ensues in Headquarters. Although Joy, Riley's main and most important emotion, tries to keep things positive, the emotions conflict on how best to navigate a new city, house and school. (official distributor synopsis)
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Reviews (17)
Pixar is back. An untraditional idea family pack that works like an incredibly emotional (but not in the figurative sense) rollercoaster ride. Pete Docter is in control again, changing everything he touches into gold. A story of Joy and Sadness lost somewhere inside a little girl going through one of the most difficult periods of her life is almost flawless. Parents hold their breath with their kids and they are subjected to Anger, Fear and Disgust. Another movie that says more about us than we realize. Not just entertaining, but educational. Movie of the year, along with Mad Max.
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Joy from sorrow. The joy of animation. The joy of discovering a new world. The gradual familiarisation with the rules of Riley’s inner universe (the film is most communicative in this respect even before the opening credits), which is entertaining in its appearance and everything that it references (psychoanalytical metaphors like dream factories, modern art, Disney movies from the 1950s), is gently incorporated into an adventure story about a budding friendship. The amusing falls, thrilling action scenes, jokes with the “maintainers” of the mind and the goofing around with Bing Bong – who is annoying in a Jar Jar Binks kind of way, but the filmmakers know that – all serve a purpose and help us get to know Riley in detail (notice the degree to which her identity is defined by playing very action-packed contact ice hockey, which is definitely not a traditional pastime of girls in American movies). We are thus entertained by the dynamics of the relationships between the characters, what happens and how the whole thing works. What happens “inside” has a direct influence on what happens “outside” and the relationship and plot lines are thus doubled, so there is always something on which to focus our attention and there is no risk that the film will get out of control. There is justification for the fact that neither of the parallel stories offers a traditional villain. The solution to the girl’s inner emotional crisis lies not in overcoming/eliminating obstacles, but in accepting them as part of her own personality (we recently saw an adult version of this in Wild). Few American films, let alone American animated films, have ever dared to cast doubt on the materialistically oriented ideology of individual happiness in this way or to assert that we should also value negative emotions (you never know when anger turned into a blowtorch might save a life). Unlike most feel-good genre films, the feeling of happiness here is not the goal or the solution, but only a means of finding inner peace, which does not derive solely from the individual’s own decisions. As Riley realises through the memory of losing a hockey match, followed by her parents comforting her and the encouragement offered by her friends, joy and sorrow work together best when we have someone to confide in. As we often retrospectively realise in real life, much later than Riley, happiness is other people (and hell is too, but that’s for another film). Thanks to this, the new Pixar movie speaks to all generations without for even a moment being preachy or blatantly lecturing us on the right way to live. Despite that, I can’t estimate how much children will enjoy a film that thematises (and very imaginatively visualises) nostalgia for childhood. For me, Inside Out is one of the most powerful film experiences of the year so far. Yes, I was moved. In this case, however, I don’t see that as having yielded to emotional manipulation, but as proof that the film worked flawlessly on every level and led me to exactly the emotional state that the filmmakers were aiming for. 85%
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Inside Out is definitely one of the most original animated films of recent times - there are very few films with such an idea and execution. I liked the portrayal and behaviour of the individual emotions, each of which had something to it. In fact, the entire content of (not only) Riley's head was thought out with the greatest amount of imagination, from long-term memory, to imagery, to forgetting. The film managed to evoke both "joy" and "sadness" in me during those ninety minutes, which just goes to show that there is no sadness in life without joy, and vice versa. After all, the remaining emotions (Fear, Anger and Disgust) are part and parcel of each of us and it is important to keep them in balance. The funniest scenes were the dream factory, the insight into other people's heads, and the recurring Triple Dent commercial, while the line with Bing Bong managed to really move and rode a rather sadder wave. All in all, this is a very well done piece of animation and storytelling that rightfully deserves both thumbs up, while managing to appeal to audiences of all ages.
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What can I say about this movie? The colorful visuals are beautiful; the animation is of a high standard, has a fascinating narrative (sometimes almost predictable), and the setting is really nice. The scriptwriting and subject matter really succeeded in portraying the inner world of a young girl, portraying her different emotional states and the human mind, so I appreciate the creators’ imagination in coming up with something so good. Among the other positive things about this movie is its sense of humor. However, some jokes, like the memory of an advertising jingle that kept popping up unexpectedly, were not that amusing. Otherwise, what would a movie about emotions be without emotions? I have to say that with this movie, the screenwriters made it both charming and melancholic. They managed to make it powerfully moving, and I almost shed a tear during the scene with the pink elephant/cat/(dolphin) at the bottom of the abyss. I have to say that I did not simply get through the movie; I had a great time watching it. When I compare it to other animated movies I have seen this year, after the unreal Song of the Sea, this was probably the most fun I have had so far, so I am going to award it 8.5/10.
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An extremely imaginative treat for the soul from Pixar. Playful, funny, moving, for young and old alike, in short, an ideal combination of everything, supported by Giacchino's beautiful music and spiced up with unreal jokes like domestic arguments at dinner. A beauty. I'm still soft from all this. But pleasantly soft.
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Photo © Walt Disney Pictures
