Remember “Cranium Command”?
Directed by: Pete Docter, Ronaldo Del Carmen
Written by: Josh Cooley, Meg LeFauve, Pete Docter, Ronaldo Del Carmen
Cast: Amy Poehler, Bill Hader, Lewis Black, Phyllis Smith, Mindy Kaling, Kaitlyn Dias
Swift shot: If you loved “Cranium Command” at EPCOT from 1989 – 2007, Inside Out is the film you’ve been waiting to see. And with Pixar helming this cerebral voyage through the life of Riley, the experience will surely reside in your core memories. But, I am getting a…head of myself. I was initially thinking this would be the first Pixar flick I wouldn’t really enjoy. I prized Cranium Command as one of my favorite attractions, because it was an interesting take on psychology and how our brains might process the stimulus that leads to our choices that leads to our overall personalities. I was afraid that Inside Out would be trite, with Joy and Sadness and Anger and Fear, and even Disgust forming the entire basis of the film. That is not what is going on inside Inside Out! It was a very animated, if you’ll forgive the direct metaphor, film.
Riley (Dias) is your girl, she’s you, essentially throughout the film. You see her birth and her early formative years as each new emotion is introduced into her brain. First, there is Joy (Poehler), followed almost immediately by Sadness (Smith), then Fear (Hader), Anger (Black) and Disgust (Kaling). As Riley grows up, her emotions keep her not only healthy, but happy and loved and warm. Everything is great for Riley, until something happens that falls on the Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale near the top. Now eleven years old, and essentially starting life over, in a new place, Riley doesn’t adapt too well to her new life.
The audience knows the real reason, her emotions are dealing with a crisis as each personality “island” begins to crumble. It seems Sadness has started to become a bit restless inside Riley, and she keeps harshing Joy’s sunny, warm glow. Joy is ever the optimist, so she and Sadness go on a journey, through Riley’s mind, to correct the mistakes that pesky Sadness seems to have wrought. That’s all I really need to say about the story, as the journey itself is one that gets more complex the deeper Joy and Sadness venture into Riley’s mind. There are other characters and realms they encounter that give the film so much depth, it’d be criminal to expose them here, I think. Or maybe that’s my “Fear” worrying about revealing too much and thinking you won’t like me anymore?
See, that’s one thing I really enjoyed (and will take with me long after this year) about Inside Out. It never really leaves you, unless you want it to. As I am writing this, I have been pretty peeved about something minor, really. And I just can’t shake my anger, sometimes. But, other times, I feel sadness. And, wow, here’s a fair warning, be ready to feel sadness for this one. If you thought the opening sequence of Up was tough to sit through, all I will say is people were heavily sobbing throughout this one! You have been warned, my Marine friends will understand this reference . . . several times throughout I caught myself saying “bearing.” It isn’t a tragic kind of sad though, it’s a kind of sad that you yearn for, because it reminds you how wonderful some times in your life were.
Inside Out is for everyone. I can confidently say that, because not one person walked out of the theater in disgust. And while some of the heavier concepts will be lost on the smaller children, the way the story develops is brilliant. I mean, it’s just one for the cinematic history books! I will definitely be adding this to our Disney collection. If you see this film and are disappointed in any way, I would love to hear about it. Oh, and even the short film “Lava” that plays before it is noteworthy. I rolled my eyes at it at first and was quickly silenced by its power.
[Swift aside: In college we were taught that science still hasn’t nailed down the nurture vs. nature debate, and for my final exam I was asked to make an argument about that. What I came up with is what I call my “snowflake theory,” that we are all born with a certain core, some are bad inherently, some are good inherently. But, our experiences, as we fall into the world and are shaped by each subtle nuance, gives us our personalities. That is what we derive our semblance of self upon. I was thrilled to see, to an extent, my theory displayed in such a colorful and imaginative way in Inside Out.]
I hope you’ll see Inside Out and think about all the things going on inside your heads, each day, each moment, and begin to wonder about what really makes us tick. This kind of stuff fascinates me, in case you couldn’t tell.
