Film Reviews

Toy Story 3

• Rating:
• Director:
• Starring: Michael Keaton
• Details: US / 103mins (G).

Toy Story is the Snow White of our generation. When a conversation of animated classics pops up, the trilogy can be spoken with the same adoration as Disney's most loved. Despite never escaping a sense of familiarity, Toy Story 3 is more than a worthy sequel and puts to shame other so-called blockbusters this season.
It has been eleven years since Toy Story 2 and time has moved on for the audience and the characters: Andy is grown up and about to leave for college but what is he to do with his childhood toys? Woody (Hanks) is lobbed into a box marked 'college' but Buzz (Allen) and co. find themselves destined for the attic. A mix up leads the toys to be donated to a day care centre, headed up by Lotso (Beatty), a friendly bear, and Ken (Keaton), Barbie's playmate. However, the seemingly happy centre turns out to be a nightmare and it's up to Woody to save his friends before Andy takes off for good.
This long-awaited sequel was preceded by a hype any movie would find difficult to live up to, but Toy Story 3, despite not being the modern classic it has been made out to be, is still a damn good movie. The breathtaking action sequence towards the close, the only occasion where the 3D shines, realises what most movies fail to achieve - genuine peril for its characters. If a live action movie struggles to realise doom for its heroes, it's doubly so for an animated film and it's testament to Pixar's skill that they managed to pull it off. Pixar may wow with its animation and cute characters, but it's the quality of writing (this time by Little Miss Sunshine scribe Michael Arndt) and its attempts to explore subjects other animated movies wouldn't dare to that elevate them above their nearest rivals. Arndt sees Andy as a God to Woody, a parental figure that has now outgrown/forgotten his children; what Toy Story 3 poses is how can you stay loyal to a parent/deity who has discarded you? It's interesting to watch this theme play out.
Familiarity stops Toy Story 3 from being the movie it could have been: Lotso is a terrific addition but his wolf-in-sheep's-clothing smacks of Stinky Pete from 2, while Jessie (Joan Cusack) and Bullseye have little to do because their story peaked in the previous instalment (remember the song When She Loved Me?). It's a pity too that the climatic scene doesn't pull at the heartstrings the way it should and that's because the scene belongs to Andy, a character we never really got to know over the last fifteen years. It maybe his scene but it hasn't been his movie/trilogy and switching character focus at the last moment dulls the emotional impact of a scene that should have been the heartbreaker to end all heartbreakers. (That's not to say a few tears won't be hastily wiped away).
In terms of sustained quality, the Toy Story franchise has to be up there with the best... But surely that's enough now. It would be a shame to chip away at its near-perfection with lesser and unneeded sequels.

Review by Gavin Burke