The Dedly Blog

Cars

Ok, there's no way you haven't heard about this movie. There's been an all out blitz of ads and merchandise that even Osama's heard about it in his cave. It made $63 million in its first week and Wall Street panicked because it was only $63 million. Dumb asses.

I don't get to see anything but kid's movies anymore. The last four films were Wallace and Grommit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit, Curious George, Chicken Little, and now Cars. I'm grateful to the writers of these films for making them sufficiently enjoyable for adults that we don't wind up clawing our eyes out and jamming straws in our ears while running out of the theater screaming, "Make it stop! Make it stop!" While each has varied in quality, there's enough story in them that adults get but kids won't, though it doesn't keep them from enjoying the film.

So tonight it was Cars. If you want a review of the plot, I'm sure that you can find one somewhere else. Don't get me wrong. I liked the story, though there wasn't anything necessarily new about it. Just cars substituted for people. It was a good movie to see for the story alone. But that's now what I want to write about. I want to tell you about the animation.

IMO, Pixar has always led the computer animation pack. They've consistently upped the bar from one film to the next (and had good stories to boot): Toy Story 1 & 2, Monsters Inc. (hair!), Finding Nemo (fish scales!), The Incredibles (complex action and cinematic landscapes!), just to name a few. Now we have Cars. We've become so spoiled by CGI that we take it for granted. I don't know why anyone isn't raving about how good it is. Let me try to recall an example or two.

Light and reflections. They've mastered albedo! You can see the landscape reflected in the fenders (at least the buffed and waxed ones) or puddles. Different materials have different textures and thus reflect light differently. Dirt and asphalt look like dirt and asphalt, which are completely different from dust covered windows, shiny fenders, glossy paint jobs, and rusted tow trucks. At times, I felt like I was looking at actual automobiles. It didn't matter that they talked.

Details. Bits of rubber bouncing jittery on the race track. (VW) Bug tracks in the dust on a window. A smudge of asphalt on a fender that doesn't magically disappear but stays put until it's blasted away by a fire hose. Speckled shadows on a road as light filters through leaves on the trees. Individual blades of grass along the side of the road, not to mention the cracks in said road.

Sound. Sure, you had the real obvious sounds like engines gunning and humming, but there were the subtle ones too like the gentle whish of driving through a grassy field. Tires running over some sand left in a parking lot. The almost silent hush of a newly asphalted road.

This is a movie to be seen just to appreciate where Pixar has brought us with computer animation. It is truly incredible. See this movie then go back and watch Toy Story and see for yourself just how the "best" keeps getting better and better.

posted by DED at 11:11 PM

 jnubel said...

Haven't seen the movie, yet. But have heard good things. Given the lack of "princesses" I'm not sure if the girls will want to sit through it. The only bad thing about Pixar is that Disney bought them! Disney's lack of creative minds have had them reeling in the box offices for years. I guess once Eisner was out of the picture, Pixar was willing to be sold to DIS. Too bad for them...

6/26/2006 9:11 AM

 DED said...

Well, there's a girl car (Porsche) in it if that helps. But yeah, it seems geared towards boys.

I agree that Disney's buying Pixar is probably a bad thing. However, Jobs came out with a sweet package so he might have some clout to help maintain the integrity of Pixar.

6/26/2006 1:08 PM