3.5 stars. Rated PG, for dramatic intensity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.27.15
Time and again, the folks at
Pixar have demonstrated a talent for wildly imaginative, outside-the-box
storytelling.
The secret lives of toys. The
source of our nightmares, and our emotions. Superheroes with family and
identity crises. The fate of a tiny, semi-sentient robot left alone to clean up
a polluted Earth.
 |
| Arlo (far right) and his tiny "pet," Spot, find themselves in the middle of a range war, when a trio of cattle ranchers led by Butch (second from left) take on a pack of rustling velociraptors. |
And now, perhaps, the best and
biggest “what if” of all: What if that huge asteroid hadn’t hit Earth, roughly
65 million years ago?
According to Pixar’s The Good
Dinosaur, at least some of the massive saurians would have established an
agrarian society, homesteading and raising families much like 19th century
American settlers. Indeed, this whole narrative is a playful riff on classic
Western archetypes, from the aforementioned farmers to nastier aggressors
lurking in outlying regions, with an actual “cattle” round-up thrown in for
good measure.
At the same time, traditional
family values have been grafted onto dinosaurs, often with droll intent, in the
time-honored fashion of countless earlier animated Disney films that have
anthropomorphized everything from elephants to Dalmatians. Indeed, much about The Good Dinosaur feels less like “standard” Pixar fare — if there is such a
thing — and more like the coming-of-age plot beats of traditional Disney
animated storytelling.
Then there’s also the matter of
the rather unusual “pet” nipping at the edges of everything else here: a
narrative element likely to make ultra-conservative,
man-is-the-center-of-everything types choke on their Cheerios.
If all this sounds like rather a
lot for one film, well ... yes, that’s an issue. “The Good Dinosaur” feels a
bit overcooked, and it lacks the tight focus that marks Pixar’s best films. I’m
always wary of scripts credited to multiple authors, and this one acknowledges
five writers — Peter Sohn, Erik Benson, Meg LeFauve, Kelsey Mann and Bob
Peterson — with Sohn also in the director’s chair.
At times, this saga doesn’t quite
know how to find its legs, much like the title character.
