Film Review #76: Monsters Inc.

Anyone who knows me knows that my sister and I never agree on anything  regarding pretty much anything.  Her and her friend Val know virtually every line of dialogue from this film.  This is my sister's all time favorite film not named Gone With the Wind.  As for me, I think Monsters Inc. is a very good film, but not the Holy Grail of Pixar animation.  It's a very amusing movie, and I liked it a lot more as a kid than as an adult.  But that's not to say there isn't anything good in it.  This is still one of the finest animated films ever made, despite my own personal flaws.

Plot: Mike and Sulley (Billy Crystal and John Goodman) live in the city of Monstropolis and work at Monsters Inc., a company where they scare children while they sleep in order to supply power to the entire monster world.  But the monsters also hide their own personal fears, specifically fear of the touch of a human child.  Sulley and Mike are the best team in the company, scaring every child in their path, thus making them incredibly popular.  Sulley is the favorite employee of CEO Watternoose, while Mike dates the secretary Celia.

But after an accidental mistake regarding paperwork brings Sulley into the path of a little girl he calls Boo, Sulley desperately tried to put the girl back in her room, but the girl has grown fond of him and follows him everywhere.  Eventually, the rest of the Monster World finds out about Boo and starts mass panicking in the city.  Sulley and Mike now need to bring Boo back into her closet, while also avoiding becoming too attached to the girl and also uncovering a secret plot about the company.

What's Bad?: Like how Doug Walker feels about Aladdin, I also feel the same way about this film.  It was one of my favorite films as a kid, but I have grown to appreciate the other Pixar films a bit more.  The film, while unique for Disney/Pixar, isn't really that special an idea.  There have been many different renditions of monsters living underneath beds or in closets, acting basically as if it's a 9-5 job.  Some have taken advantage of their source material, such as this and the Nickelodeon show "Aaahh Real Monsters!!!", then you have the bad ones like Little Monsters.  But by no means is this an original idea, and that is kind of disappointing.

What's Good?: This film is impeccably cast.  I don't usually go in depth about the cast of an animated movie, but I feel I have to with this one.  John Goodman is a fantastic Sulley, Jennifer Tilly is awesome as Celia, Steve Buscemi is a good villain in Randall, and while I'm not a big fan of Billy Crystal, he is pretty good in this movie.  It was the first time since Toy Story 2 that a Disney film gave me a strong and likable cast that was on par with DreamWorks films like The Prince of Egypt and Shrek.  I'll specifically praise John Goodman, who I've always believed was a fantastic actor who should always be in Disney Films.

The relationships between the characters is also genuine.  Whether it's between Sulley and Boo, Mike and Celia, Mike and Sulley, or even Sulley and Mr. Watternoose, the relationships seem very genuine, with no rhyme or reason to not believe that these characters wouldn't work in real life.

Again, the animation is wonderful.  It would take a very long time for Pixar to create a film with insulting aniation, but we'll get to those films later.

Overall: The good outweighs the bad for this film enough to make Monsters Inc. a pleasure to watch for all ages.  It may not be the best of Pixar's efforts, but it should certainly be held in the same regards with Pixar's better films.  It's definitely worth a watch, if you haven't seen it yet.

Final Grade: A-