Pixar

"Up" starts tomorrow, and it will be a hit.

Yeah, I hear you. Not really going out on a limb, am I? The cynics who think Pixar's success is pure fluke (also, the same folks who think the human eye a result of random mutation) bet that the film company will show its humanity and cough up a clunker any day now. Their hope is tomorrow. I don't think so.

CNN probes Pixar's production team on the eve of Up's release trying to get to the bottom of home run after home run. Steroids? No. The creators themselves chalk it up to the fact that the entire team is comprised of artists. Ahhh. A bit of sophisticate snobbery. (You can read CNN's article here). I think their success is easier than that. Here's my take.

1. Story. A good story is a good story is a good story. Tell me a story. Please. Keep it simple, toss in a few twists, and voila! Nuance is great for the nerds writing the reviews or for the dweeb teaching the college level course on the Significance of Proletariat Oppression in Pixar Productions. The rest of us want a story we can track. Pixar always gives you a great story.


2. Characters. Give me people or critters to care about. Give me someone to loathe. And make them normal. Hollywood and Rockefeller Center, NY are not normal. Nebraska is normal. Montana is normal. Pixar always delivers superb characters. The old guy in "Up" was a hit in my eyes the first time I saw him. When I heard Ed Asner's voice coming out of him, he only got better (despite Ed's lefty leaning tendencies...segue...)


3. Issues. Leave the lefty issues out. The environment is not dying (I fear we may get that in "Up"). All corporations, especially big oil, are not evil. Leave it be! Amazing that they resisted it in Nemo and Monsters, Inc. There's enough stuff that timelessly touches all of us where we live without getting a NOW or Greenpeace commercial.


4. Art. Pixar set the bar higher than any company even though an animated movie could go with Toy Story. Then they kept setting it higher with each subsequent movie. The animation is objectively beautiful. The screen is a feast for the eyes. Much of animation today is ugly. On purpose. Pixar does not give such an assault. I've sat in the darkness shaking my head at the extraordinary complexity and beauty in so simply drawn characters.

Tomorrow "Up" hits the screen. No doubt we will once again be treated with a feast for the eyes, the heart and the mind without the slightest hint of guilt in the aftermath. That is Pixar at its best.

It's too bad more non-animated movies don't try their hand at Pixar's formula. It's not cosmic. It used to be the norm. Were it so again, Hollywood might see the run on the box-office they have desperately longed for.