Why do we think what we think and feel what we feel? What determines who we are and how we respond to life’s circumstances? How can the same memory be joyous sometimes and sad at others? Where do ideas come from? What happens to the things we’ve forgotten? Why does the jingle from that chewing gum commercial always get stuck in your head? Why are dreams so weird? Just what, exactly, is going on in people’s heads? These are some of the many questions Pixar’s latest film, Inside Out, sets out to explore. The result is one of the most charming, heartfelt, and poignant films the studio has ever created, as well as one of the most creative movies of all time. It will not only make you laugh and cry, but then it’ll make you stop and consider why you just laughed and cried.
I’m an optimist. I always have been, even through the roughest patches of my life. But being an optimist is hard work, and is often ridiculed. Today, movies filled with darkness and despair are seen as more “real,” while optimistic movies are ridiculed as being juvenile or unrealistic, and happy endings are easily dismissed by many. So by all accounts,Tomorrowland shouldn’t exist. Big motion picture companies don’t spend $190 million on an original science fiction film about how hope and the mere act of not giving up can save the world. And, unfortunately, judging by the film’s mediocre results at the box office they probably won’t again in the near future. But to continue on the path we’re currently following would be, as Casey Newton would put it, “feeding the wrong wolf.”
Teenager Casey Newton spends her days in school listening to her teachers tell her over and over that the world is doomed, that war, injustice, and climate change will be the end of us, but never answering Casey’s question of how we fix it. She spends her nights breaking into NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in order to sabotage the demolition equipment poised to destroy one of their launch pads that is no longer in use, hoping to save both the space program that has inspired her as well as her dad’s job at NASA. Things start to change when, upon having her possessions returned to her after being arrested for trespassing, she’s given a mysterious pin that, when touched, seemingly transports her to another world. The vision only lasts a brief while, but it shows her a future where humanity is united in the pursuit of expiration, led by dreamers and optimists for whom Enstein’s quote “Imagination is more important than knowledge” is a guiding principle. The pin’s vision fades, and Casey is left with the unyielding need to find out more. Her quest will lead her from her home to a bizarre science fiction shop to a mysterious young girl who knows more than she’s letting on and finally to Frank Walker, who might have been able to take her to this Tomorrowland if only he hadn’t given up a long time ago.
