In any case...my Pixar movie watching has been slow. I watched Monsters Inc. I don't have much to say about it. It's cute and sentimental. The opening credit sequence is pretty fun. It reminds me of the opening sequence to 101 Dalmatians only not as amazing. Dalmatians opening is a 10....Monsters is a 6. There, that's all I have to say on the matter.
I actually wanted to put Pixar on hold for a short minute and talk about a different movie entirely for this blog post.... a special episode of "Virginia Rambles About Animation" if you will. I watched The Iron Giant for the first time ever this past week. It is to my complete shame and humiliation that it has taken me this long to see such an amazing, nearly flawless movie. Of course, I was 11 when this movie came out and the commercials I saw for it made it look lame (in my humble opinion) not to mention none of my friends were interested in seeing it and the one friend I had who did go see it said it was "ok." On top of that I had a lot of friends whose parents wouldn't even let them see it because "it swore too much." A concept that is fairly laughable now but that's what happens when you grow up as a Mormon in Utah.
In any case, the wrong has been righted. I have seen the movie and it has been added to my Top 5 Favorite Animated Features of All Time list. It's currently at number 3 but that's flexible.
Anyways, this movie is incredible. As Brad Bird's directorial debut in feature length animation it is a knock out (and slightly associated with Pixar as the next movie he directed was The Incredibles). The story is flawless and the characters and their development are so seamless. It tackles such heavy topics like violence, gun control, life and death, standing for what you believe in, choosing the type of person you want to be no matter the opposition.... and it does that without becoming heavy handed or preachy.
These are all themes that are very near and dear to my heart. I came to the conclusion at a very young age that violence does nothing but create more violence. No matter how good a cause it may seem to be to go to war I strongly believe there is always another way to solve our problems. An exception I might make to that is World War 2... of course WWII would not have been the crisis it was if WWI hadn't happened and there was really no purpose to that war except some convoluted idea of honor and national pride. Sorry...I'm getting off topic. If your solution to solving your problems is to aim a gun at it you should probably use your brain a bit more and come up with a better idea.
The topic of death in this movie is shockingly religious considering the time in which it was made but it's presented simply and so innocently that it doesn't cram Christianity down your throat if you don't lean in that direction. When Giant is first confronted by death his dear little friend Hogarth explains to him that all good things have a soul and your soul goes on living forever and that it's not ok to kill but it is ok to die. This struck me as a very mature thought coming out of a 10 year-old boy but I really appreciated it. Not only for the very comforting message it relays but it shows some deep character development which has taken place entirely off screen and not even within the time frame of the movie. Allow me to explain: Hogarth is being raised by a single mother and it is never explained what happened to the father. Hogarth explains to his robot friend that his mom taught him about souls. The way he talks about it though is deeply personal and the only reason I can think as to why a mother would explain the eternities to her son like that is if a death has taken place within the family. It was at this point that it became clear to me that Hogarth's father wasn't some bum who had walked out on the family or something but that he had died. This is further cemented in a quick shot of Hogarth's nightstand seen later in the movie where there is a framed picture of an Air Force pilot getting into an airplane and by the fact that in that scene Hogarth is wearing the same helmet that the man in the photo is wearing. Not only has Hogarth's father died but the death has happened recently. The fact that Hogarth's father was in the military makes it easy to surmise that his death probably happened in the heat of battle and makes for a subtle parallel for the movie's theme of non-violence.
Another thing that I really appreciate about how the death of Hogarth's father is handled is that there is no scene of mom saying something like "You laugh like your father." And son growing somber and saying something like "I miss him..." (I mention this specifically because it's in the deleted scenes so it was almost included). I don't like it when movies have scenes like this because it reads as so trite and unrealistic. Death is something that we all carry with us. We all know someone who has died, we all have had someone who was very dear to us die. It has a life changing effect on us when someone dies. Do we have conversations like this when that person dies? Maybe I'm out of the loop but I've never heard one. Of course we all miss someone who has died and of course we are often confronted with things that remind us of that person but we carry them with us and life continues. I feel like it's more life like to include the subtle things that point to an absence then to spell it out for the audience.
And speaking of religious undertones. I like how it is never explained where the Iron Giant comes from or why he's on earth. Much like those Big Questions many people find themselves asking: "Where did I come from?" and "Why am I here?" The point is that for the purpose of this story it doesn't really matter the where or why of the Iron Giant what matters is what he does with the time he has on earth. (It's another thing that makes me grateful for their editing, as an explanation for the giant's back story was almost included in the finished movie and it's a little too Kryptonian for my taste.)
Finally I love that idea of "You are who you choose to be." There are so many excuses that start with "I can't help it, that's just the way I am." That is a lie. All people have complete control over the things they do and say. Even the things you don't think you have control over are things you have control over. You choose the person you're going to be. Sure, it may be hard at times, and sure, there may be pressure from all sides insisting that you do certain things and act certain ways but ultimately you're the one that decides what you're going to do and who you're going to be.
Sorry if this has gotten overly preachy. Brad Bird just neatly summed up almost everything I feel passionate about in an hour and a half.
Let's talk about art: this movie has the obvious touch of Mr. Bird. The character style rolls over very neatly into The Incredibles. Annie Hughes basically looks like Ms. Incredible if she were a waitress in the 1950's.
There is a near seamless integration of computer graphics and traditional animation in this movie and it is astounding. The only moment that cuts it short from being perfect is the very end when you watch a screw roll through a field of very obvious CG grass. It's very out of place.
And a few miscellaneous things:
My friend pointed out to me that Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston make a nice cameo as train conductors in this movie. And if you don't know who Frank and Ollie are you don't know Disney nearly as well as you think you do!
I like that the military is not demonized in this movie. It would have been so easy to do but they didn't. The people in this movie are portrayed as reasonable, logical people that can perceive when something is good. No one freaks out when a gigantic robot rolls into town because that robot just saved two boys from falling to their death. And the General forebears nuking the robot when he learns that said robot only attacks defensively. It's the paranoid zealot who seems to have something to prove that makes all the trouble. It makes for a nice change of pace.
And one more thing. Dean has a Jack Kerouac poster in his office/dwelling. I find it hard to believe that such a thing existed in October of 1957 considering Mr. Kerouac's big hit novel "On the Road" had just been published the month before. I know they're trying to make it obvious that Dean is a beatnik but the guy would have owned the book, not a poster. Jack Kerouac is not a band, he's an author. I know of no author that makes posters...maybe for their book but not for themselves. I know it's a little thing and it's only in the movie for half of a minute but it's been bothering me ever since. They should have put the book on the coffee table in plan sight or something if they wanted that detail added in. The poster is out of place.
