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Review: Inside Out

★★★★★

Five Stars

Director Pete Docter has been behind some of the most emotional premises ever cooked up by computer animation veterans Pixar. Remember that scene at the end of ‘Monsters Inc.’ where Sulley leaves Boo in the human world for the final time? The opening ten minutes of ‘Up’? Few audience members can sit through those scenes without shedding a few tears, and that’s putting it mildly. I challenge you similarly to view Docter’s latest offering, ‘Inside Out’, with dry cheeks.

‘Inside Out’ tells the story of twelve-year old Riley. Her role is not so much the lead character, as the setting of the film. Uprooting Riley from her life in Minnesota when her father gets a new job in San Francisco, the film alternates between showing the changes that physically take place on the outside – such as moving into a filthy San Francisco apartment (watch out for a dead rat which looks suspiciously like ‘Ratatouille’s’ Remy here…), and moving schools – as well as the inside of Riley’s mind. 

The inside of the mind is represented in part by ‘Headquarters’, an abstract interpretation of the mind’s control centre populated by five emotions: Joy (Amy Poehler), Sadness (Phyllis Smith), Fear (Bill Hader), Anger (Lewis Black) and Disgust (Mindy Kaling). The film explores the emotional fallout (as rendered through these internal manifestations) when Riley begins at a new school and, simultaneously, Joy and Sadness get stuck in the depths of Riley’s mind, deep within long-term memory. With Riley’s mind left in the hands of Anger, Fear and Disgust, her outward behaviour rapidly changes as these emotions govern without Joy’s firm leadership to keep their influence at a minimum.

This constant juxtaposition between the world in Riley’s head, and the way it affects the external world, both directly and indirectly, is an interesting concept which allows the film to work on two levels. On the one hand there’s the dynamic race back to ‘Headquarters’ which Joy must undertake to resume control. This is a ceaselessly creative and visually mesmerising spectacle which takes us into the depths of ‘Imagination Land’ and ‘Dream Productions’, a Golden Age Hollywood-inspired film studio where a team of mind-workers create Riley’s dreams – Joy’s odyssey gives the film an action packed thread which is sure to satisfy younger audiences. On the other hand, as the film progresses, we begin to catch sight of the bold and thought-provoking message at its core, a message of such sophistication that all audiences will be able to take something away. 

At five years in the making, ‘Inside Out’ is one of the longest Pixar films in development, and Docter has spoken of the difficulty in creating a world which accurately reflects the workings of the human mind. Part of the film’s originality derives from the intricacy with which the mind has been conceptualised. From Riley’s core memories, which power different aspects of her personality (represented in different ‘Personality Islands’), to the storage of countless memory orbs in the depths of long-term memory, and a hilarious sequence taking place in abstract thought; the complexities and mysteries of the human mind have been brilliantly illustrated and integrated as parts of this world. There is even a train of thought, literally. 

Pixar has suffered something of a critical backlash over recent years, with 2011’s ‘Cars 2’ being widely panned, and the studio’s followups ‘Brave’ and ‘Monsters University’ faring only slightly better. Accusations that Pixar had lost its ‘mojo’ and was being co-opted by Disney into a tumult of sequels ensued. Does ‘Inside Out’ mark a turning point for the studio? Can first time feature-film director Peter Sohn’s ‘The Good Dinosaur’ in November 2015 sustain the quality this summer release has set? ‘Inside Out’ certainly shows something of a return to form in the creative culture of Pixar, and judging by the breathtakingly beautiful trailer for ‘The Good Dinosaur’, it will not disappoint either. 

Last but certainly not least, praise must also go to Michael Giacchino’s truly mesmerising score. From the second the Disney and Pixar logos appeared at the start of the film, and Giacchino’s musical cues sprung delicately through the darkened theatre, I was captivated. Known for his work on this summer’s blockbuster ‘Jurassic World’, and the Oscar winning score for Docter’s previous film ‘Up’, he does not disappoint here. There are moments towards the latter half of the film featuring a very special character called Bing Bong (Richard Kind) where the score only serves to amplify some of the most heart-wrenching storytelling the company has come up with. Can you really fail to love this pink-cotton candy, part cat, part elephant, part dolphin creation of Docter’s? You’ll have to see the film to find out.

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