[yasr_overall_rating]
After young Riley is uprooted from her Midwest life and moved to San Francisco, her emotions – Joy, Fear, Anger, Disgust and Sadness – conflict on how best to navigate a new city, house and school.
Pixar’s “Inside Out” is every bit the emotional powerhouse that it’s predecessors “Toy Story” and “Up” were, but with animation beyond anything you’ve ever seen before.
The movie follows 11-year-old high spirited and funny Riley (Kaitlyn Dias) as her dad’s new job in San Francisco uproots the family from Minnesota. Helping to navigate Riley through this change are her emotions: Joy (Amy Poehler), Fear (Bill Hader), Anger (Lewis Black), Disgust (Mindy Kaling), and Sadness (Phyllis Smith). The emotions live in Headquarters, the control center of Riley’s mind, where they work together to advise her through everyday life. Although Joy, Riley’s main and most important emotion, tries to keep things positive, the emotions conflict on how to navigate a new city, house, school and social life. It was refreshing to have the story show that Joy isn’t always the best emotion for the job, and that our imaginary friends can always help us.
We all have voices in our heads. “Inside Out” gives us a thoughtful perspective on how our personality traits steer and shape our decisions and reactions. Because the majority of the movie is inside Riley’s head, the scenes are psychological concepts turned into kaleidoscopic wonderlands. There’s the Dream Factory where dreams are shot like Hollywood blockbusters and TV sitcoms, the shadowy land of the Subconscious, Long Term Memory and Abstract Thought. There’s even a Train Of Thought that transports Riley’s memories and emotions around.
The writers never talk down to kids or up to adults. The story, script, humor and concepts of the movie are such an open, honest and insightful look at what makes us human that it is absolutely for all ages. As a parent, I often find myself trying to remember what I was like and what made me tick when I was my kids’ age – especially when grown up me has no clue as to why they do or say the things they do. “Inside Out” made me remember exactly what it was like to be 11, and hopefully helped my kids empathize with what it is to be a grown up parent.
Riley’s core memories are a constant factor on how she functions. “Inside Out” will be a constant factor on how I judge animation and story telling. It is absolutely on my top 10 favorite movies of all times.
LAVA
True to their roots of amazing animation shorts before their feature movies, “Inside Out” is preceded by the short “Lava.” Don’t be stuck in the line for popcorn and miss this spark of music and animation brilliance. “Lava”‘s director James Ford Murphy was inspired by the music and life of the late great Israel Kamakawiwo’ole – know by most for his ukelele rendition of Somewhere Over The Rainbow. “Lava” will melt even the hardest of hearts. Who knew that so much love, hope and beauty could be expressed in less than 5 minutes.
“Inside Out” arrives in theaters June 19th
