Cars

The latest offering by the King Midas of animation studios, Pixar, is very enjoyable but not as thrilling as its predecessors.

Cars is a movie technically impeccable, just not as refreshing as Toy Story, as inspiring as A Bug's Life, as smart as The Incredibles, as sweet as Finding Nemo, or as heartwarming as Monsters, Inc.

All those attributes apply to Cars too, just not in the same way.

I remember the first trailer I saw of Cars, a while back, when it was still slated to be released last year. I didn't like it. It told me nothing at all. As opposed to, for example, The Incredibles' teaser trailer, which left me laughing and longing to see the movie.

Naturally, I assume I wasn't the only one left cold by Cars' first trailer. The movies' producers obviously tested the trailer and quite likely saw the same reaction from many in the audience, which prompted them to delay the release and retool the picture somewhat.

Anyway. Cars is the story of a race car that could be the first rookie ever to win the Piston Cup in his first season. Things, obviously, don't go as he expects, and he finds himself lost in the middle of the desert, somewhere along the once famous Route 66.

Here, he meets the people living in a town long forgotten by everyone, maps included, who still hope, someday, to see the tourists come back.

I don't want to spoil the plot, so I'll stop here, but maybe one thing that differs in this movie, as opposed to the ones that preceded it, is the fact that many of the characters are only caricatures, stereotypes. Now, maybe the other Pixar movies had stereotypical characters too, but they were more subtle.

We actually brought the kids with us (it was Daniel's first time ever at the movies!!), but they didn't seem to enjoy the picture much. They were both quite restless (a sign that what was going on on the big screen wasn't very interesting) and Danny eventually just wore himself out and fell asleep in my arms (so sweet.)

I also should say that Cars is almost two hours long, an amount of time few kids the age of ours can manage standing still.

Anyway, would I recommend the movie? Sure, it's entertaining and wonderfully done (you can even see the reflections of the surroundings in the cars as they move around.) The actors do a fine job, the story isn't bad, the music is good and you can find much worse movies at the multiplex during the summer, so, if you like animated movies, go see it. You'll enjoy it.

Grade: 7.5