Toy Story 3
U, Nationwide
The third and final film in a franchise isn’t usually up to much, but not so with Toy Story 3. It may even be cinema’s first must-see sequel to a sequel. It is wondrous and a delight and because those deliriously talented people at Pixar obviously love these characters to death, then so too do we. In fact, it’s the only press screening I’ve ever attended where everyone stayed right to the very end of the final credits, presumably because the characters were still chatting away in a frame to the side, and no one wanted to leave them behind; no one wanted to say that final goodbye to Woody or Buzz or Jessie or Slinky Dog or Mrs Potato Head, who, in the five years since the last movie, may have had work done on her nose. It certainly looks at a different angle on this outing. Usually, critics don’t hang about although, I suppose, I should say that the exception is always the Observer’s magnificent Philip French, who never shifts until the house lights come back on, and who may have this thing called ‘integrity’. I would like integrity and even tried it once but, alas, it gave me a headache and also didn’t go with anything else I had to wear. I’ll probably try it again at some point in the future, but thought I’d leave off until the autumn, when I might buy a coat to set it off properly. Obviously, it would have to be navy.
Integrity. And this film has it in spades and bus-loads and buckets and anything else you can put integrity in bar taupe. (Integrity has never looked good in taupe.) Here, Pixar do everything that DreamWorks should have done with Shrek 3 and didn’t. It is true to its characters, and their back stories, and does right by them. The jokes are character-driven rather than gruesomely imposed. There are surprises, right turns when you are expecting left ones. The animation is sensationally detailed and beautiful. And although it zips along speedily enough, it isn’t afraid to slow down and put real emotion up on the screen. It has its themes — abandonment, obsolescence, loyalty, the value of friendship, growing up — but because these emerge organically from the story, things never feel cheesy or forced. This feels like a story that needed to be told. How triumphant is that?
So, 15 years on from the first film, where are we? Well, Andy, the young boy who owns all the toys, is now 17 — I know! We remember him when he was only this high! — and about to go to college, so must clear out his bedroom. All his old toys, along with his sister’s discarded Barbie, are put in a bin-liner to go up into the attic. However, due to a mix-up, the bag is donated to the Sunnyside Day Centre, a happy-looking place which pleases most of the toys, as it is full of kids, and more than anything else a toy wants to be played with. Woody (Tom Hanks), though, isn’t having any of it. They are Andy’s toys, he tells the others, and they must always be there for Andy, even if it means being put into storage. Woody escapes which, it turns out, was a good decision as the day centre is not what it seems; it is actually a nightmarish prison run by Lotso (a strawberry-scented plush purple bear who has turned wicked) and his various scary sidekicks, which include a cymbal-clashing monkey and a Tiny Tears-style baby doll with a droopy eye who may be the creepiest thing you have seen in a movie. Too much for the kiddies? No, because, as I always said to mine whenever I locked them in the cellar for a bit, ‘It’s good for you to visit dark places every now and then.’
Woody must rescue his friends, of course, which means that, action-wise, this is essentially a prison-break caper, but there is so much more to it than this. There is fun. There is laughter. There is Buzz (Tim Allen) being reprogrammed as a Spanish lover. There is Ken (Michael Keaton) modelling his extensive wardrobe for Barbie (Jodi Benson). There is real peril, perceived as such because we adore these characters so much and don’t want them to get hurt. This is a labour of love that extends to every single detail. Each toy moves as, anatomically, such toys would have to move. No incidental character is too incidental. And it’s extremely moving, shamelessly hitting empty nesters right where it hurts. Did I well up at the end? I did. Am I ashamed? No. I’m just sad I was wearing red. Red never goes with welling up. I read that once in Vogue.
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