MATER D-PLUS: Things I enjoyed during our viewing of
Cars 2 more than the movie itself:
- The Toy Story: Hawaiian Vacation short. Witty, smart, classic Pixar.
- The Lion King 3D extended preview. No, it's not necessary, but hot damn is it gorgeous.
- That brief glimpse of Brave.
- Holy crap, there's a 3D Morgan Freeman dolphin movie coming.
- The brief nod to Ratatouille during the Paris sequence.
- Closing my eyes and thinking of this picture of The Rock riding Splash Mountain, which remains awesome.
This is a loud movie which nevertheless put a 3 1/2 year old to sleep halfway through at 12:30 in the afternoon. It's real pretty, but in no way compelling.
I've had to sit through the Dolphin Tale trailer entirely too many times in the past few months. One thing that I found interesting when I saw Green Lantern in 2-D last weekend was that while there were a number of 3-D movies trailered, they made pains to state that the films would also be available in 2-D. I think the feedback on 3-D and the strong performance of the 2-D prints of Green Lantern and Pirates is convincing studios that 3-D isn't a panacea, but should be reserved for films that really warrant it. (Transformers may be one of those films.)
ReplyDeleteLoved the Hawaiian short, very lukewarm on Cars 2. I figured out who the bad guy was almost right away. My almost 4 yo loved it, it was her first movie theater experience.
ReplyDeleteoh, that was me. I also want to add that I was happy that they did put in a small bit re: Doc Hudson.
ReplyDeleteOne wonders whether they were anticipating the critical response to Cars 2 when they decided to trot out that gorgeous stuff from Brave. Lasseter lasseter lasseter
ReplyDeleteLasseter? Say a little more.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure you already knew what I was going to say.
ReplyDeleteOur 3.5 yo, who was very psyched to see it, began losing interest about halfway through. 7.5 yo said he liked it. Mom & Dad? Underwhelmed.
ReplyDeleteHawaiian vaca? So awesome I felt an echo of the verklempf from TS3. The aqauatic treacle preview of Flipper loses a tail? Actually induced anger from me.
We didn't get Brave or dolphins! Was this because we saw the low-class 2-D print?
ReplyDeleteCars 2 exceeded my lower expectations--it's at or near the bottom of my Pixar list, but still better than most everything else out there.
I snickered when I saw the fake advertisement for "Lasse-tyre" during Cars 2.
ReplyDeleteThe boyfriend and I are with Jay on this one. Plenty of witty, punny stuff in there, and the visuals were great, so we enjoyed it. No, it is not a *great* Pixar film, but I'd still put it ahead of many other movies out there.
ReplyDeleteOn a different note: we were a little disappointed with the TS short. Don't get me wrong---I love the TS characters. But normally, the short is about the Pixar future---some new animator who has been working on something different. And this one was about the Pixar past.
The heroine of Brave is a redhead. I forsee much merch ending up in my house. I might even let the kids play with it.
ReplyDeleteWe didn't get the Brave preview either, even in 3D. We had Happy Feet 2 and the dolphin movie and one more I can't remember. Lion King was a pre-preview not in 3D.
ReplyDeleteMy issue with the Brave trailer is, in what little we see, we see her supposedly kill a bear. Has a Pixar hero ever killed another breathing being before? And does de-feminizing her (which I know a lot of people are rooting for) mean she needs to kill things, especially in a teaser trailer when it's the only thing we learn about her? (And that she's probably Scottish.)
ReplyDeleteAs the original working title for this film was "The Bear and the Bow," I think there's more to the whole shooting the bear thing than just "she needs to be defeminized."
ReplyDelete