"Cars" - Life is a Highway by Homer Yen (c) 2006
To watch the latest offering from Pixar animation is to be awed at the craft. There is a 6-minute cartoon that precedes the main feature. It spotlights two competing one-man bands who try to garner the appreciation of one young fan. When it's over, you'll see about 500 names that are credited with the making of that cute offering. I'm sure it must take hundreds of man-hours just to produce one scene. But I don't have to ponder about the science behind the animation. I just get to enjoy the end result.
A lot definitely goes into these films. With "Cars,' it bursts with color. The racing sequences buzzes with excitement. And you'll certainly appreciate it because it gives you that same kind of feeling when a friend goes through a lot of trouble to create a perfect gift for you. It's not so much what the gift actually is. You just admire the effort that was put into it.
As you can begin to suspect, I enjoyed the film more for its technical qualities. The drama was less inspiring. It focuses on a racing car named Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson). He's arrogant, selfish, but is a talented race car. In fact, he could become the first rookie racer to win the Piston Cup, an achievement that's never been garnered by a rookie.
Making his way across the country to compete, he gets lost and winds up in the forgotten hamlet of Radiator Springs. It's a town that sits on Route 66 that thrived in the 1950s. But when the interstate bypassed it (along with all of the travelers), this town seemed to become frozen in time. The inhabitants look a little bit older, but the facades still hark back to an era of jukeboxes and James Dean.
In the film, towns that promote a slower way of living allow those that speed down the highway of life to pull over and to re-examine a few things. And that also happens here as McQueen meets some of the denizens. This includes the craggy mayor Doc Hudson (voiced by Paul Newman), a curvy Porsche (voiced by Bonnie Hunt) and a bunch of other vehicles that reminded me of my old Matchbox car collection.
I must go back to my admiration for technical excellence again. I was impressed by how the Hudson automobile really took on the look of Paul Newman. And, I thought it very clever of how the cars had 'faces' that could bring forth emotion on an almost-human level.
With a close-knit group of citizens like this, it's hard for someone not to learn something about themselves. And so part of the film is about self-discovery and part of the film suggests that you need not speed through life all the time.
I think about other Pixar films and would say that this film didn't seem as magical as others like "Toy Story" or "Monsters, Inc.". I think that it's because this is a film about cars in a world of cars. It plays like a straightforward drama. Those other films juxtaposed two worlds in a memorable way. Also, the film runs longer (or feels that it runs longer) than those other films. But stay behind for a real treat as Pixar revisits those other films in a daffy and unique way.
Grade: B
S: 0 out of 3 L: 0 out of 3 V: 1 out of 3
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