Film Review #86: Cars

What did I just watch?  I mean it.  This is what I said after watching this film for the first time with my cousins on Christmas Day 2006.  Of all of the films that Pixar and Disney have come out with over  the years, none of them have perplexed me more than this one.  After all, with their success with The Incredibles, Pixar seemed to finally master the animation of people.  They didn't look that wooden and flimsy like they did in Toy Story.  But to have Pixar do a 180 and make a film to market (Ya know, like Disney would), it's really depressing.  Cars has signaled the beginning of the end for Pixar.  While great films like Wall-e and Up were still in the pipeline and ready to go, we all knew that the days of innocent little Pixar just making films for the sake of making good films was over.  Disney had moved in, and the new dark age of animation was about to begin...

PLOT: Set in a world with talking cars (which raise so many questions I'll get to later), one of the best and fastest cars is Lightning McQueen.  McQueen hopes to be the best race car in the entire world by competing at the Los Angeles International Speedway.  But when an accident forces him out into the world alone, he recklessly zooms through a town called Radiator Springs, causing damage to the pavement.  He's ordered to repair it, ultimately giving us "Slumdog Millionaire" in the car world.  He meets new cars, becomes friends with an assortment of "colorful" characters (Larry the Cable Guy, George Carlin, Cheech Marin), and learns a new appreciation for hard work and the country lifestyle.

What's Bad?: There are so many questions that have been unanswered.  Here are my questions:

1. If the world is all cars, how were all of the landmarks and structures built?
2. Why would the cars have doors if no people drive them?
3. Why was this movie made?
4. How are new cars made, and what do they do with the old ones?
5. How are some cars able to be race cars and others supposed to be cows or something?
6. How was this greenlighted as a Pixar Film?  Why not go off and blame the DisneyToon Studios like with that horrible Plane movie?

I could keep going, but I think my list speaks for itself.

Then, of course, you have the boring and predictable storyline about the hotshot who gets dragged down to appreciate the value of hard work.  It's kind of like Pocahontas, where you could have done something different with the source material, but give us a lazy and not thought out story.

What's Good?: Some of the jokes work, I guess.  And some of the side characters are kind of engaging, but the main leads are a bit of a drag to sit through.  I especially didn't like Larry the Cable Guy as Mater, and was equally stunned that he got the starring role in the sequel...

Overall: For Pixar, this was a HUGE step backward.  They would have to outdo themselves considerably to keep the Animation Crown away from DReamworks.  The results?  Well, check me out in le ratatouille...

Final Grade: D