Inside Out Review: Reading Minds

Riley's emotions look on in Inside Out

Photo Credit: Walt Disney Studios

Inside Out

A+

A review by Frederick Cholowski

Welcome back Pixar.

After an unprecedented streak of not making a bad film Pixar began to enter a bit of a slump. Cars 2 was a shockingly bad (by Pixar standards), Brave was meteorically generic, and Monsters University was fine but did not have many of the elements that made Pixar films of the past so special. Inside Out, Pixar’s latest, is the studio’s return to what made it special and is a great reminder of what made me fall in love with the studio in the first place. Creative, funny, and full of heart Inside Out is one of the best films Pixar has ever created and one of the best of 2015.

The concept of Inside Out tries to answer the old question of what are people actually thinking. According to the film the mind is broken up into five emotions, Joy, Sadness, Anger, Disgust, and fear who combined all determine how a person acts. The human at the center of Inside Out is a young lady named Riley (voiced by Katlyn Dias) and her along with all of her emotions (voiced by Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith, Bill Hader, Lewis Black, and Mindy Kaling) must deal with moving away from her childhood home in Minnesota to a new unfamiliar one in the middle of San Francisco. Along the stressful journey both Joy and Sadness get lost in the banks of long term memory leaving only Anger, Disgust and Fear in charge which threatens to ultimately change the base of Riley’s personality.

As with every great Pixar film, the creators use wildly creative concepts in order and tell a story of basic human emotions. The realizations of all of the emotions and their role in shaping memories and personality is so beautifully realized on screen it is stunning. All the ins and outs of how memories are stored and shaped along with how someone’s personality is formed is absolutely magnificent and provides opportunity for amazing looking animated vistas. Every portion of Riley’s mind from the headquarters to the subconscious are explored in such interesting and funny ways giving life to every encounter throughout the runtime of the film.

Of course no Pixar film would be complete without a huge amount of heart at its centre. One of my main complaints with the last three Pixar films was that they lacked any semblance of the heart that defined so many of Pixars’ previous works. Either it felt really forced (Cars 2 and Monsters University) or it really did not connect (Brave). Inside Out is Pixar’s return to the perfectly integrated emotional storytelling of their past, giving us a human story of leaving a place we love behind and adapting to something new while at the same time dealing with our own emotional turmoil. It’s fantastic and heartfelt while never feeling sappy or forced in any way. Inside Out also manages to integrate humor into the proceedings in wonderful ways, throwing in great, mostly adult oriented, Jokes to help lighten up the sometimes heavily emotional proceedings.

The voice cast are all superb and wonderfully cast. Amy Poehler feels as though she was born to play the role of Joy and it even feels very similar to the character she played so masterfully on Parks and Recreation. Phyllis Smith is hilariously melancholic as sadness bringing a lot of humor and heart to the proceedings. The rest of the emotions paly a little bit of a back seat but it is always amusing to see Lewis Black get super angry, or Bill Hader freak out about random things. The voices of the human characters are also perfectly done, Katlyn Dias is magnificent as the central character and her parents voiced by Diane Lane and Kyle MacLachlan do perfectly in their reactions to the new stressful situation.

As per usual with Pixar the animation here is stunning. As mentioned earlier, the realization of the mind and all of its elements are beautifully realized and unlike anything I have ever seen before. Everything in the film just pops off screen, every idea is so colorful and creative at every turn. It really makes for a fully fleshed out world that looks pretty from its first frame to its last. The score is also wonderful outlining each element of the film with the perfect emotion. Pixar’s technical performance has always been a strong suit and Inside out is no exception.

Inisde Out is one of Pixar’s finest films and a spectacular film to bounce back with. The film succeeds at being beautiful in both a visual and storytelling sense in a way only Pixar at their peak can capture. If you only want to see one animated film this year I have a good feeling that nothing will surpass the wonderful Inside Out.