Published on July 10th, 2015 | by Simon Maracara
0Inside Out: As good as everyone is saying. Probably better tbh
Pixar and Disney are back to form in the latest film, ‘Inside Out’, with the voice talent supplied by the likes of Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith and Mindy Kalling, helping to tell an incredibly sweet, smart and tears-inducing story that should hit home with adults, and with enough charm to keep the children’s attention despite its complicated premise.
It’s bigger on the inside! Basically, the human mind is literally a control room where the embodiment of all of the emotions co-exist taking turns at a main board that helps them in the task of shaping someone’s life. In this case: the life of Riley, an 11 years old girl whose world gets shaken when her parents decide to move to a different city, leaving Joy (Poehler), Sadness (Smith), Disgust (Kalling), Fear (Bill Harder) and Anger (Lewis Black) calling the shots in this brand new scenario.
Even though the first 10 minutes of the movie are heavy on exposition, there are a lot of jokes to water down and enhance the digestion of all the information, making every situation immediately relatable before moving on to the plot both inside AND out of Riley’s brain (see what I did there?).
The film directed by Pete Docter (‘Monsters Inc.’ and ‘Up’) is based on his own experience while watching his daughter’s changes in personality when moving his family to Hollywood to start working for Pixar. Docter reached several psychologists to present the train of thoughts, the long term memory storage and the imagination workshop, among other colorful places with an impressive accuracy, or at least a very plausible explanation of its mechanics.
No doubt, every parent (uncle, aunt, big brothers and sisters) will drag their kids to the cinemas in hopes of taking a lesson or two about growing up, once more with feelings, giving it a steady flood of viewers to guarantee a sequel (or two) of this fantastic, smart and emotional world.
P.S. A big shout out to Bing Bong (Richard Kind), Riley’s imaginary friend, who out-Dories Dory, from ‘Finding Nemo’, as the funniest/most heartbreaking supporting character in a Pixar film.
‘Inside Out’ gets released in Ireland on July 24th of 2015.
About the Author
Simon Maracara Venezuelan journalist living in Dublin. A mess who’s driven to do something greater. A peniless sitar player. Whedonist.