Inside Out – Christian Movie Review & Why I’m Torn About It
[Note: after you read my review for “Inside Out” below, if you’re a fan of C.S. Lewis, please check out my new blog Stabs of Joy or my podcast Aslan’s Paw. Both seek to crack open the surprising treasures of Christian belief — the things that Western society has forgotten, ignored, or never encountered — with the help of logic, literature, film, music, and one very unsafe Lion.]
I’m torn. This movie — about the emotions of a girl named Riley when she and her parents have to move away from where she grew up in Minnesota and start a new life in San Francisco — has me conflicted. There is a very specific modern psychological theory (a Darwin-influenced one), published in the 1960s, that informs the entire world of “Inside Out.” I’ll dive into all of that in detail in the “Worldviews” section, but first let’s talk about the movie in general for a moment.
(WARNING: I’m going to dive deep into this film’s themes, and you might be wondering, “Isn’t this a bit too much for just a Pixar movie?” Well, it’s not just a Pixar movie. Pixar never makes just kid’s movies. It is actually a very deep thinking movie that presents a complex mix of beliefs and assumptions about truth beneath all of that stunning animation and adorable hilarity.)
Inside of the character Riley are the Emotions — which are sentient beings, the primary characters of the film — and they completely control Riley. They pull every string that makes her tick (including controlling what she thinks about, apparently), and they also exert total control, like a band of dictators who happen to be a cute little comedy troop, over the moviegoer. I’ll explain why in a moment. (By the way, does each Emotion character also have little emotion characters in their heads, and do those Emotions have smaller emotion characters in their heads, and…it’s like a crazy room of mirrors in a fun house that never ends!)
Kicking Puppies and Pixar Predestination vs. Pixar Freewill
Writing a bad review of “Inside Out” would be like kicking a puppy, stealing a baby’s candy, and then clicking on the “thumbs down” icon on every overly cute dancing, singing, juggling cat/baby/dog YouTube video ever made.
“Inside Out” is so perfectly calculated with its cuteness and emotional provocation (and manipulation) that you have no choice but to like it. And I am not exaggerating. You truly have no free will once the movie begins. Every laugh (a couple of which are hysterical, rolling out of your seat laughs), sniffle, gasp, and smile has already been prepared for you in advance like a pre-packaged bag lunch, and it’s there waiting for you when you sit down.
And the filmmakers are so skilled in knowing exactly how/what/who/when to trigger facial expressions, sounds, and punch lines that every person in the theater moves with ease down the same track together like a ride at Disneyland. Everyone hits their pre-programmed emotional reactions like the coded cues of animatronic robots in the Small World ride.
It’s Pixar predestination.
In fact, forget about the free will vs. predestination debate. Pixar has settled it: you will laugh, cry, and gasp exactly when Pixar orders you to, whether you like it or not — and whether you know it or not.
The Secret Is Out
Of course, every movie is trying to do that. It’s just that “Inside Out” does it so well (and with so little subtlety because of its subject matter) that it lays bare with perfect visibility the true intent of every big money movie ever made: Hollywood tent pole movies — the big blockbusters in which shareholders are investing fortunes — are carefully engineered to force you to feel and think exactly what it wants you to feel and think to ensure that you love the film, tell your friends about it, and cause others to buy tickets to it. Cinema is culturally accepted dictatorship.
And “Inside Out” is one of the most colorful, engaging, imaginative, and well-crafted emotional dictatorships that has ever been made by all of those presumptuous, high and mighty tyrants of Hollywood who gaze with condescension down at all of us sheeples, I mean, ahem, moviegoers.
I think I just kicked a puppy.
Okay, on to the parental guidance before I talk more about why this movie is so aggressive (and effective) about being perfect that it’s distracting…
Parental Guidance Issues at a Glance for this PG-rated film…
Sexual Content/Nudity/Themes of Sexuality and Romance: A married woman, as we see inside her head, fantasizes about a handsome Brazilian pilot that she met on vacation, which is used for laughs.
Violence/Gore: Slapstick cartoony bangs, crashes, slaps, and kabooms. Though I suppose there are two murders…of…cloud people…in Imagination Land. (I’m not making that up. That’s really in the movie.) So be warned. If you’re sensitive to seeing cloud people being mercilessly terminated, you might want to cover your eyes during those scenes.
Language: The “Angry” character talks fondly about wanting to say curse words that Riley has learned. This is done for laughs, of course. In one scene, he is about to say one (and in the context of the sentence, we know it’s an s-word), but there’s a convenient “beep” sound that covers the swear word up.
Alcohol/Drug/Smoking Content: None.
Intense/Frightening Content: There’s a really big creepy cartoon clown. A cartoon dog gets chopped in half in a dream, and it’s severed back half runs around without the front half. It has a weird surrealism feel to it, but it’s in a comical context (and is actually a funny scene).
(Review continues below)
Please Support Our Affiliates!
Entertainment Value and Film Craft
As I mentioned already, the execution of the story is flawless. It’s another Pixar masterpiece. There is absolutely no doubt about that. The voice acting is superb across the board, and the animation is so expressively human that it’s almost unsettling.
But still, beneath all of the filmmaking perfection, you feel manipulated. Maybe it’s because it’s a film about our emotions, and while it’s talking about emotions, it’s hitting all of our emotional buttons relentlessly. And you have to hand it to them. They’ve got this whole movie thing down. The moment you sit down in the theater you are no longer in the driver’s seat. Pixar is taking over, and they will ensure that you react exactly how they want you to react.
“Inside Out” will go down as one of the best animated family movies ever made. I will not argue that point. But I suppose I prefer more subtle films. This movie’s constant lunging for my heartstrings with its overwhelming cuteness and awesomeness — and its intense focus in the story itself on those very emotions it was creating in me — had a very strange counter-effect: it didn’t make me feel like I was watching a story being told. At times it made me feel like I was watching a video of myself watching the movie as the movie coached me on how I should feel about watching me watch the movie that was about those feelings that were actual characters in the movie.
It was an odd experience. It was sort of paralyzing. But, yes, it’s still a Pixar masterpiece. It was just slightly too brazen and obvious for my taste with its “Hey, I’m cute and funny and clever! You WILL love me!” and it was just slightly too precocious to the point of being slightly off-putting.
I will say, however, that three segments — the Dream Production scene, the “perfect boyfriend” ladder scene, and the bonus clips in the credits (in which it looks inside the heads of other people besides Riley) — were just HYSTERICAL. Those three segments alone made the movie worth the trip. I would happily watch the film again just for those hilarious scenes.
Worldviews, Subtext, Symbolism, Themes of Redemption, Social Commentary, Etc.
Before I jump into this, let me make a disclaimer: I am very torn about this movie. It has some truly exceptional messages: the power and priceless value of family and having a healthy relationship with your mother and father. And I loved the way it captures the preciousness of one person’s life — all of our memories, triumphs, defeats. The film sees value in every corner of our existence, even in our most painful sorrows. I absolutely loved that. Couldn’t get enough of that aspect of the film, and I’d happily see it again just to ponder those things.
But here is why I’m so torn about this complex, beautiful work of pop art:
1. A Film Built Entirely On the Darwin-Influenced Discrete Emotion Theory
“Inside Out” is built entirely on the modern psychology theory called “discrete emotion theory,” by Silvan Tompkins, whose theory was allegedly influenced by Charles Darwins’s “The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals.” The film’s use of the Tompkins jargon, like “core emotions,” in its central plot points are dead giveaways. Here’s a quick definition of it that I grabbed from Wikipedia:
Discrete emotion theory is the claim that there are a small number of core emotions, typically six to ten or so. For example, Silvan Tomkins (1962) concluded that there are eight: surprise, interest, joy, rage, fear, disgust, shame, and anguish. This theory states that these specific core emotions are biologically determined emotional responses whose expression and recognition is fundamentally the same for all individuals regardless of ethnic or cultural differences…Tomkins’ (1962, 1963) idea was influenced by Darwin’s concept [in The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals].
Not every psychologist has bought the Tompkins theory: “James Russell and Lisa Barrett have criticized discrete emotion theory on several points. Those include problems in finding correspondences between discrete emotions and brain activity, variability in facial expressions and behavior, and gradations in emotional responses.”
However, despite it only being a theory, the discrete emotion theory is swallowed whole hog by this film as if it were fact. And I’m just mentioning it as a heads up, in case you’re wondering what presuppositions they’re using for their world-building in Riley’s head.
2. The Film Subtly (Maybe Unintentionally?) Ignores that a Child’s Emotional Development Begins in the Womb, Not After Birth
Psychotherapists have discovered that babies in the womb feel emotions — everything from anger to joy. However, when “Inside Out” depicts the “birth” of a child’s first emotion, it takes place right after the baby is born when she is an infant, when she opens her eyes and sees her parents. Interpret that however you want as far as any deeper social commentary, but the science is not accurate. They could have done some humorous, artistic things if the first appearance of the emotion “characters” happened in the womb (besides being more scientifically accurate). But, I get it, it’s a sweet moment when little Riley opens her eyes and see her mother and father for the first time. I understand why they’d choose that moment for “Joy” to be born too. It emphasizes the powerful, priceless influence that our parents have in our lives.
3. The Film Omits Any Exploration of Spiritual Reality
Now, I wouldn’t ever expect Pixar to go in this direction because of who they are and who owns them, but their depiction of a person’s inner world also completely ignores the spiritual/faith side. The film presents a broadly appealing, quasi-naturalist view of what comprises the inner life of a human being.
As mentioned above, the emotions run the entire show inside of Riley, including her thoughts. Don’t get me wrong, we all have moments when our emotions are calling the shots, and there are modern psycho-babble theories that believe our emotional self lies at the base of everything we do (certain popular marketing theories, like “Lovemarks,” base their entire marketing philosophy on that belief), but I don’t think people should mindlessly embrace the film’s vision of our internal world. The depiction of Riley’s inner world sort of deifies emotions, and it quietly suggests that this emotional schematic is “all there is” to us — that nothing else happens inside us: no influence from the “extra-dimensional” plane of spiritual existence (i.e. spiritual warfare Ephesians 6:12, Matthew 12:43), and certainly no indwelling of the Holy Spirit (John 14:26) whose Voice — that still, small voice — can have more influence than a thousand emotions…
4. Searching for a Picture of the Soul That’s Even Brighter Than “Inside Out”
For all the bright colors, dazzling animation, and uproarious comedy that had me laughing and smiling in “Inside Out,” there’s something missing in this film, and it is a significant “something.”
There’s a telling scene: when the character Joy plummets into the great chasm where memories fall, she lands in a wasteland piled up with thousands of memories. And the memories are dying and disintegrating, turning into dust and float
ing away — gone forever. It is a very emotional scene, a very sad one.
But, interestingly, the Bible has a much different view about our internal world.
God sees, preserves, and records everything. Nothing is lost forever.
Jesus taught that Jehovah keeps track of the tiniest detail of our lives — to the point of knowing the number of hairs on our head (Matthew 10:30).
But it goes deeper than the scalp. Psalm 56:8 says this:
You number my wanderings;
Put my tears into Your bottle;
Are they not in Your book?
And Psalm 139:16 says:
Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed.
And in Your book they all were written,
The days fashioned for me,
When as yet there were none of them.
When we open our hearts to Christ and freely accept that precious gift of grace and forgiveness that God is offering to us — that gift of an eternal relationship with our Creator — the implications and blessings that flow from it are monumental.
As shown in the verses above, Jehovah maintains a careful record of every thought, emotion, and memory we experience, and He keeps it forever. Not even Alzheimer’s can permanently destroy those things. (I personally believe that the moment a person with Alzheimer’s steps into Christ’s presence after he or she dies, God restores to their spirits the joy of their lives that they had forgotten.)
But this bright reality is nowhere to be found in “Inside Out.” And that made me sad.
Conclusion: It’s a Cinematic Masterpiece, Yes, But “Inside Out” Could Have Been So Much More
Whether it was intentional or not isn’t the point: by omitting all the spiritual truths mentioned above, “Inside Out” feels oddly contradictory in certain moments — a very subtle melancholy that hovers in the back of your mind like white noise — despite all of its dazzle and adorable hilarity.
I hear you: all of this analysis is too much for just a kid’s movie, right? Well, if Pixar is going to think this deeply about its content, to the point of throwing discrete emotion theory at us for an hour and a half, then I think it’s time that moviegoers start thinking deeply too about what they’re consuming. We shouldn’t check our brains out at the door and pick them up when we leave the theater.
Despite all these caveats, I have to give “Inside Out” a high rating because it is a masterpiece in its craft and genre, and it does do something exceptionally well: it makes you see the priceless value of family and life — how beautiful and precious all of it is, even in the moments of deep sadness.
My rating for “Inside Out”: [usr 8]
[If you’re a fan of U2 or C.S. Lewis, please check out my new blog Stabs of Joy that explores dozens of Lewis books and U2 albums to answer one question: how do we find joy in the midst of extremely difficult circumstances?]
***
Note about my ratings:
1 star = one of the worst movies ever made (the stuff of bad movie legends), and it usually (not always) has below 10% on Rotten Tomatoes
2-3 stars = a mostly bad movie that has a handful of nice moments; it usually falls between (but not always — as is the case with “Spy”) 10-30% on Rotten Tomatoes
4-6 stars = a decent movie with some flaws, overall. Four stars mean its flaws outweigh the good. Five stars mean equal good, equal bad. Six stars mean it’s a fairly good movie, with some great moments even, that outweigh a few flaws. A 4-6 star rating usually means it falls between 30-59% on Rotten Tomatoes (but not always).
7-9 stars = a rare rating reserved only for the best movies of that year; and a film must have a Fresh Tomato rating (60% or higher) on Rotten Tomatoes to be given 7 stars or higher.
10 stars = one of the best films of all time, right up there with the all-time greats (i.e. Casablanca, The African Queen, Gone With the Wind, Lawrence of Arabia, Star Wars Episode IV, Indiana Jones, etc.).
If you are planning on seeing a movie soon, please consider purchasing your tickets online through our affiliate link above with Fandango, a high-quality vendor for online movie tickets. This will allow us to keep our site online and continue providing you with quality reviews.
thank you so much for this review! It was really helpful!
Awesome! Really glad it helped you out!
I wish I could read your review before I see any movie. This is exactly what I was looking for. Many, many Christian reviews manage to see “Christ’s redemption”, God’s love, and many other Biblical themes in places where they do not exist – and in fact where they are contradicted and mocked. You have done a great job of analyzing the film from a Christian perspective without being so taken in by the good that you are unable to see the bad. I appreciate that you have done your homework and realize there is more going on in the movies than a bit of entertainment…and it isn’t only Pixar that contains a deeper philosophical layer that can influence our thinking even if we don’t pick up up on it.
Great review, I really appreciate it.
Chad
Wow, thanks very much, Chad, for taking the time to write that. Really appreciate it. It’s definitely so easy to fall into that trap you mentioned in the first half of your comments — I’ve fallen into that trap myself a few times when I wasn’t being extra careful, but I’m learning as I go. Hollywood can be very sneaky. We need to be “as wise as serpents, innocent as doves.” Thanks again so much for the comment, and I’m really glad the review helped!!!
Thank you for writing the review that I would’ve written. Thank you for being more diplomatic than I would have been. I am a believer in the Judeo-Christian God and I also have a master’s in clinical psychology. Let me qualify my religious preference. We have both Jews and Christians and my family and these days I’m leaning more toward the Jewish side. (But I was raised a Christian and accept Jesus’s teachings). Clear as mud, eh?
I was disappointed in this movie for two reasons. The first was that it did not make any room for someone’s internal spiritual life. It could have been an ode to Atheiesm In the way that it based everything in the brain and the idea that the brain and core emotions are the things that makes the whole of the person.
The second reason I didn’t like it was because quite frankly it did not move me. And I’m somebody who feels great empathy and who cries easily. I could not empathize with any of the characters or the emotions. Well, that’s not completely true. I did for a moment empathize with the invisible friend from childhood and the unselfishness he displayed in his final act. But the rest of the characters left me rolling my eyes to some extent.
The best thing I had to say about the movie is the ending credits where they get inside the heads of various people and animals. I was sorely disappointed that there was not more of it in the film.
Now I’m going to say the thing that most people will not agree with. I did not like the Riley character at all. She came off as more self-centered than most children and her life was not interesting. Because I did not find the character likable, I could not bring myself to find her life interesting. I find it really strange that an entire movie was built around what goes on in the head in a tween girl. And I am going to assume that Riley was the main character because the gentleman who made the film based the character entirely on his own daughter including her physical appearance. As parents, we all believe that our children are the most special. But most people have enough humility to know that we would not try to base a feature film on them. When I was discussing the film with my husband last night I referred to it as the ultimate act of narcissism since it was so plainly based on the creators child. Why do I call it narcissism? Some of the worst narcissists believe that their children are the best and do anything to promote them above all else. I was thinking last night if I had the money, if I would be making a feature film about my own children. The answer is no because there are only two children out of the world of children. I am a filmmaker and a writer as a hobby, but in stories like this where we would like the audience to find something universal, I would find a way to include more than one child and radically different types of children. I don’t assume that all 7 billion people in the world want to watch my child in a feature film.
The final thing I couldn’t get past was the animation of the humans. The art of animation has advanced since the days of the creepy humanoids in the Polar Express. Pixar didn’t have to try to create more human looking humans and they didn’t get it right either. Studies have shown that when it comes to animation, people prefer to see characters that are not trying to look human. We naturally find it deeply unsettling when something non human is made to look human. There is only one creator, and in a way I wonder if our discomfort is caused by the feeling that we know we are not creators.
I’m still wondering about all of the newspapers that gave this film a 100%. I am only guessing that Pixar paid these newspapers to write positive reviews. But, I’m going to be the lone voice that says this movie is not great and the emperor has no clothes.
Sariah: really enjoyed your comment. In fact, I think it was my favorite review of the film so far. I hadn’t thought about the points you make about the Riley character (had been too distracted with all the Emotion characters). Very interesting points — definitely a lot to ponder. I even mentioned a couple points you made to a friend the other day. Thanks so much for the comment!
Kevin, thanks for your great review. It helped me understand much of the disquiet my wife and I both felt but couldn’t quite pinpoint after watching “Inside Out” and spending several hours talking about it.
I particularly agree with how you described the filmmakers’ efforts at emotional manipulation – although for us, its blatantly open manipulation was exactly what left us cold. With “Inside Out” we DID sense being forced to feel for the characters; with other Pixar movies we’ve seen (such as “Toy Story” or “Wall-E” or even “Cars”), the emotions were far less forced and felt far more natural.
I’ll mention a few other aspects of the film that mattered to us:
1) It felt at times as though, like Joy dragging Sadness, the filmmakers were bound and determined to drag the moviegoers by the leg through every last aspect of their animated creation – every island, every memory bank, every last visual construct of their invented universe – whether it added to the pace, flow, and development of the storyline or not. There were some moments during the film that we wondered whether “Inside Out” was just a very-well-made educational film that, just like some guided tours do in real life, had ended up going on WAY, WAY too long.
2) More strangely for us, and for a Pixar production, neither of us felt particularly drawn to Riley, her family, or her personal situation. Both of us are emotional “softies” watching a Pixar movie on Father’s Day – but to us, the family backstory and Riley’s entire character development felt generic and uncompelling. By movie’s end, I began to wonder if Riley’s character was deliberately left unconstructed, because any sort of true character development would have exposed the mismatch between Riley-the-human-being and Riley-the-simplistic-mental-construct of Joy, Fear, Anger, Disgust, and Sadness that the filmmakers present to the moviegoers as Riley’s sole source of motivation.
3) Even on a humanist level, “Inside Out” was not a success for us. Just to see if we were judging “Inside Out” unfairly, we put “Wall-E” into the DVD player when we got home. In the first five minutes, we see the Pixar touches that make us care: Wall-E’s bleak, empty, destroyed world and Wall-E’s dedication to duty in single-handedly working to tidy it; the weird attachment to Broadway show tunes; the compassion toward a cockroach; the collection of silly trinkets. We cared more about Wall-E after five minutes than we did for Riley, her parents, or any of the main characters of “Inside Out” by movie’s end.
Maybe if Bing Bong had had just a little more screen time…
– Charlie
Charlie, like Sariah’s comment, I really enjoyed reading your response (and thanks for the kind words). Your and Sariah’s comments are the best reviews of the film I’ve read so far — certainly more resonating than any of the ones on RottenTomatoes. You really nailed it — the “education film” feeling, the way it dragged the audience (like Joy dragged Sadness), and the contrast with much more endearing characters like Wall-E (which is such an excellent point: within the first five minutes you care more about Wall-E!). Really appreciate you sharing your thoughts.
Sariah,
I didn’t read your post until after I had posted mine – it’s interesting to read how similar your reaction to “Inside Out” was to my wife’s and mine.
I don’t know either why the movie’s ratings are so sky-high. I don’t believe it’s payoffs; more likely, it’s a case of a famous name and a big reputation fooling people into giving more positive reviews than are deserved.
Toyota has made some not-so-great cars; Frank Sinatra recorded some not-so-great songs; and (this time, I believe) Pixar created a not-so-great film. Not bad; just not-so-great.
– Charlie
Taking my 7 and 10 year old daughts tomorrow. Thanks for the heads up about what I can prep them on ahead of time and discuss afterwords.I’m pickier than most about what I show my girls but this one I think will be doable. Hopefully on level of Tinkerbell films, the recent live Cinderella, and the classic Muppet Show and Looney Tunes. 🙂
I’m exactly the same way with my daughter, so I know exactly what you mean. (And, yeah, I especially loved going to see the recent live Cinderella with my daughter. It was refreshingly old-fashioned. And she loved it.)
I took the self-sacrificing imaginary friend to be a Christ-figure, though as such it bothered me that he (?) regarded himself as being “dead weight” and otherwise expendable (even if useful for a time) through the main character’s moment of greatest need. The suggestion seemed to be that one ultimately does well to leave this “imaginary friend” behind.
I agree, Jim, there was sort of an ambivalence about the “imaginary friend” character, and I had similar mixed feelings/reactions.
Wow! Great details. Thank you for this well written, very informative review.
Sure thing, Lisa, really glad it was helpful to you! Appreciate your comment.
I was searching the internet for Christian reviews on Inside Out to see if there was anybody out there who actually thought about the spiritual implications of this movie. Yours was the first I clicked on and it was exactly what I was looking for.
After reading rave reviews everywhere, even on the site I frequent most often (PIO), I commented on PIO’s blog that I had a big problem with the lack of decorum (showing Riley’s bare backside) and other content–read cheap jokes (the bleep and the Brazilian)–that I don’t expect from a Pixar film.
Then, I went on to say my first impressions of the movie. My point was that this was the second disappointing movie Pixar has made (the first being Brave–by far the worst animated movie from Disney, let alone Pixar). Inside Out lacked the power that Pixar films usually have; the messages and plot felt muddled and claustrophobic. The diversity of individuals’ memory and perceptions went unrepresented–it was as if the writer(s) was/were stuck in their own heads. To expound on that, some people’s memories work differently. I use the example that The Giver is much more relatable to me in the way memory and emotions are represented.
More specifically, the biggest problem of Inside Out was the theme and you hit upon this brilliantly. Christian understanding especially, says that we should not let our emotions dictate our lives. The movie basically says that emotions are the only [important] element of the human experience and that there is nothing wrong with that. I am so glad you mentioned the Darwinian influence. I noticed it as I watching the movie. I said on the other site (forgive me for quoting myself), “Ideas from Evolutionary psychology could be teased out of Inside Out.” I also noticed that the writers almost made it a point to say that Riley became a person after she was born. Though, one of my biggest problems with this movie was that it didn’t really recognize the personhood of anybody.
Back to the storytelling, I don’t give this movie many points; you give it much more credit than I do from a storytelling perspective. Mind you, my favorite movie of all time is Toy Story 3 and I wrote a paper for school explaining why Pete Docter was one of my professional heroes, so it pains me to say the storytelling was bad. Ultimately, the lack of a meta ending that should have shown Riley as being the ultimate mind behind her own psychology, rather than separate entities controlling her, was bad character development and is problematic both on a psychological and philosophical level. We never found out who Riley was. Riley (and every other character by the end of the movie) was merely a vessel for these little people inside her head. I actually believed the movie was going to take an interesting turn when Joy fell into the Memory Dump. I thought for moment that maybe we would get to explore the idea of Riley making/ finding her own happiness after her little emotion person representing happiness had “died”. Instead we got a story about Joy coming to to terms with her person growing up and having to experience new emotions. In the Toy Story movies, we care about Andy (a character who is mostly absent from the story) because we care about Woody and Buzz. But even literally being inside Riley’s brain does not make me care about her. I compare the two because one does creating a persona by proxy, well, and the other completely misses the mark. Additionally, I can relate to loving my toys as a child, I cannot relate to any of Riley’s very specific, yet shallow experiences.
Speaking to that latter point, the movie didn’t seem to have an audience–it’s too complex and nostalgic/sad for kids (in my theater there was a kid, maybe 4 or 5, who started hysterically crying during a specific scene) and too scrambled and simplistic, working on generalities, for young adults. The only audience I could see relating to this movie is parents, and then I think, “What useful information could that audience glean from merely being able to relate?”
Brilliant, brilliant analysis — wow, was a pleasure to read. Pixar should hire you as a consultant, haha. I’m glad you found me, and I’m really glad you appreciate the spiritual aspect. Takes a long time to mine that deeper layer out of a review and write it, so it’s always a joy when people out there find it valuable. You pointed out some really interesting things about the story: “Ultimately, the lack of a meta ending that should have shown Riley as being the ultimate mind behind her own psychology, rather than separate entities controlling her, was bad character development and is problematic both on a psychological and philosophical level. We never found out who Riley was.” There was an empty feeling throughout the film, and I hadn’t been able to put my finger on why or what it was, but your comments nailed it. Thanks for sharing. I was a big fan of Toy Story 3 too, and I’m hoping Pixar returns to form when it finishes Toy Story 4 (which they’re working on right now).
Yes! Thought and reflection… deep truths from the Scriptures are presented here! Thank you, brother. My children have never been to the movies… and our whole family is supposed to go see this film. I needed to read this review to prepare their tender hearts. I needed to hear from a mature disciple as yourself. This took your time, brother. Thank you.
Thanks so much, Christine. Can’t say how much that means. Your comment is exactly why I write these. 🙂
After seeing the movie I was not sure how I felt about it either so I asked my 12 year old son what he got from the movie. His reply was that there was no God in her life.Your review just qualified our feelings in a way we could not understand at the time. I feel that God is our consciousness.
Thank you for a great review. My children are not watching this movie, like you said , it is cleverly made but we are teaching our children that you can have control over your feelings at all times with the help of the Holy Spirit that resides in the perfect part of you, your born again spirit. I pray that more parents will take the time to look at what their children are watching.
Thanks, Ingrid. Definitely agree re: the help of the Spirit. I’ve seen the Holy Spirit in action in those situations and it really is possible and amazing to behold. Thanks for the comment.