Teaser Trailer: Inside Out

Oh Pixar, you tease!! Just so no one out there gets TOO excited, the first trailer for the next film, Inside Out, contains about 30 seconds of footage, and the rest is made up of clips from their previous films. Still, it feels like it's been way too long since we've had an original Pixar movie, and this one definitely looks promising (it's more appealing to me than say, Brave, anyway). Being partially set inside the mind of a 11-year-old girl, and with Monsters Inc. and Up director Pete Docter at the helm, there's plenty of potential for going wild with the premise. June 2015 couldn't come sooner...

Friday Clips #10

We're long overdue for a Friday Clips post! Below: a supercut of Wes Anderson's POV-vehicle shots; an Honest Trailer of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which is actually one of their more positive efforts but still points out, deservingly, lapses in the movie's narrative logic; a LEGO short film that spoofs Guardian of the Galaxy's mix tape; a video showing Pixar's beautiful colour script at work...

Quick Thoughts: World War Z, Only God Forgives, Monsters University

I surprised myself last week by dragging my lazy ass to a staggering THREE preview screenings last week, none of which I had to review... But thought I'd share a few quick words here if anyone cares to read.

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World War Z - It's not as bad as the negative pre-release press (ballooning budget, last minute rewrites) would have you believe, but meh, it's nowhere near as good as you want it to be either. I haven't read Max Brooks' zombie apocalypse novel which it's based on, but word is that Marc Forster's adaptation removes everything remotely interesting in favour of making a dumb, blockbuster action-centric thriller.

The decision to keep carnage off the screen where possible to get a PG-13 rating is crippling and laughable: there's a scene where a character whose hand has just been chopped off is bandaged up with not a drop of blood in sight. You really expect us -- adults -- to buy this? There are a few suspenseful moments, and I was moderately entertained in the moment, but as the film limped to its disappointingly scaled-down climax, I started to care less and less until walking out of the film feeling unsatisfied. World War Z opens on Thursday, and if you hate 3D, I recommend that you do not see it in its worthless 3D state.

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Only God Forgives - I was surprised at how quick this got a screening here.. within a couple weeks of its booing at Cannes! It's not getting boos from me though, but nearly a week since seeing it I'm still yet to be able to formulate a coherent thought about it. Any Ryan Gosling fans casually heading along to see their favourite hunky Drive star act tough and cool will probably be in for a deeply unpleasant time at the movies: Nicolas Winding Refn's ultra-stylized neon-splashed noir, set in the sordid underbelly of Thailand, unfolds with the blood-curdling, unsettling tenor of a horror movie rather than your traditional crime drama.

Gosling's performance, all smoldering glances, is even more pared-down than in Drive; how many pages of dialogue did he have to remember, like two? Maybe less. If you don't mind pure style, visuals and atmosphere over plot and everything else, Refn's film might seduce you. Dig that Alejandro Jodorowsky dedication in the credits. Only God Forgives opens August 1st.

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Monsters University - I for one would prefer if Pixar stuck to new stories instead of cashing on their existing franchises, but when it's as expertly conceived as this Monsters Inc. prequel, it's hard to complain. University definitely has a Pixar-by-numbers feel, as opposed to say, Toy Story 3 - but it's also another a smart, funny and visually dazzling demonstration of what they do best. Monsters University is out in theatres July 11.

Alternate Ending: Toy Story 3

SPOILER WARNING: Do not read or watch any further if you have not seen Toy Story 3!! But if you have you'll probably find this prank pretty funny (well at least those of you with a dark sense of humour). The guy who made this video re-edited the film so it would end in that super-intense furnace scene where Woody and friends almost meet their death, then gave it to his mum as a christmas present. See what happens... (before Pixar takes this video down).

The Secret Life of Pixar's Pizza Planet Truck

Last week NZ Herald film blogger Dominic Corry wrote about "universe building" in movies, where you'll find the same characters popping up in movies other than the one they originally appeared in, e.g. Michael Keaton's Ray Nicolette in Jackie Brown, then reappearing briefly in Out of Sight a year later. This is most probably old news, but I just stumbled (thanks tumblr) onto a similar thing, albeit at a much more obscure, detail-obsessed level with Pixar and their prop/character Pizza Planet Truck. Check this out, this little dude really gets around, having cameod in every Pixar film except The Incredibles:

Films from top to bottom: Toy Story, Toy Story 2, Toy Story 3, A Bug's Life, Monster's Inc, Finding Nemo, Cars, Ratatouille, Wall-E, Up

Lee Unkrich Joins Tumblr

Lee Unkrich, the director of Toy Story 3, has taken to Tumblr to document the making of his next, yet-untitled Pixar movie with one photo a day. Tumblr is a blogging platform that uses a similar "follower" concept to Twitter, and it's incredibly user-friendly ("blogging for lazy people"). The ease of adding text, photo, video and audio makes it an ideal way for a film director - or any artist - to quickly share their creative process with the public. Unkrich has only added two photos so far - a close-up of a keyboard, a sandwich with a side of broccoli - but these aren't really clues to the film: on his twitter, he said, "About my photo-a-day project: don't expect revealing clues. This is a personal project detailing my experience in an abstract way". Which is fine, since there's always the risk of revealing too much. It's an ingenious teaser anyway. We don't know anything about this movie at this stage but we'll be following closely.

Old School Pixar

From 1972, this really neat video shows one of the earliest CG 3D animations ever, made by Ed Catmull, the founder of Pixar. It eventually found its way into a sequence in the movie Futureworld. Read more about it here.

10 Pixar Themes Played by 1-Man Band

A truly wonderful tribute to Pixar's music... played entirely by 1 person! File under: best thing you'll see all day.

Cars 2: A Pixar Wreck

I guess it had to happen sooner or later, and it's perhaps not surprising that Pixar's golden track record has been tarnished by Cars 2, an unnecessary sequel to one of their lesser films, its existence made only possible by the franchise's apparently lucrative merchandising. It's currently sitting in the mixed yellow zone at Metacritic, and I tend to agree with the comments at the negative end of the spectrum. As you can expect from Pixar, the film is stuffed with dazzling action sequences, faultless animation, etc. Unfortunately there's little that's emotionally engaging about any of it here: not the waffly, cliched Bond-riffin' spy plot, not buck-toothed tow-truck lead Mater (Larry the Cable Guy) whom you want to clobber constantly, and as already proven by the first film, not its distancing human-less, all-vehicle world. Cars 2 feels like an aberration from Pixar, a hollow, exhausting, shrill, blatantly studio-ey product. It's also the first Pixar film that's ever given me a headache. Boo.

Trailer Mash-up: Cars 2: Fast Five

Nicely done!

House the Air Up There?

Watch this awesome recreation of the balloon-lifted house from Pixar's Up. Already holding the world record for the largest balloon cluster flight ever attempted, this experiment will air as part of National Geographic Channel's new series How Hard Can It Be? Beautiful!

'Premake' Trailer: Up

That clever dude who takes clips from old movies to create fake, re-imagined trailers for popular movies has made another winner with this live-action '60s version of Pixar's Up. Just fantastic, see if you can recognise what movies they're from:

Animated Short: Alma

Watch this beautifully creepy animated short film from Rodrigo Blaas, an animator for Pixar who made this while working on Up. According to Hollywood Reporter, it's getting made into a full-length feature with Guillermo Del Toro helping out! I totally love The Twilight Zone-for-kids feel of this one...

Trailer Mash-up: Toy Grit

Monday Mash-up Time! The trailer for the Coens' upcoming remake of John Wayne's '69 western True Grit (or perhaps, to be more precise, adaptation of Charles Portis' novel which Wayne's movie was based on) meets Toy Story 3, and the results are superb...



See the original trailer here.

Up in the Air

Could this be the most adorable movie-themed engagement photo shoot ever? Probably. Click here to see of more pictures of this Up-inspired shoot...

On the other hand, this one makes me want to vomit...

Luxo Goes Nutso

This is a darkly funny parody of Pixar's logo intro from CollegeHumor where Luxo the Lamp goes homicidal. Don't think we'll be seeing this one gracing the start of any Pixar film anytime soon...

Wall-E in the Flesh!

Spotted this over at SciFiSquad - a real-life Wall-E!! Or at least something close enough. It's called a DustCart, and is part of a research program to clean up the streets of Italy. Click here to check out more photos. Pretty cool.