Pixar's The Good Dinosaur

[Drizzle]

Personally I thought they should've released this next year with Finding Dory. Having TWO original Pixar in one year, especially where you can't help it but to compare Inside Out, which might be seen as the "A" movie.

Well, Finding Dory was originally supposed to be released this November. The Good Dinosaur was supposed to be released in May 2014 before they changed the movie around and it had to be pushed back.

 

[Octoberist]

I understand that but I think it just hurts TGD.

 

[terry78]

Just got back from it, and yeah it has a few moments where you get emotionally gut punched, especially if you're a dad or have ever had a dog. It has a shockingly large amount of dark humor, not really out of Pixar's wheelhouse, but a couple gags I was like, "did they really do that?"

 

[CB Fan]

Anybody else seen this? I'm gonna try to see it Sunday.

 

[redhawk23]

I really enjoyed "The Dinosaur Falls Down A Lot."

I know it almost goes without saying when it comes to Pixar but the animation on this film is outstanding. Pixar's animation has finally come to a point where it can replicate the energy and the stretch and squish of traditional cell animation. There was a nice old school feel applied to the movements of a lot of the characters in this film. There are also a few sequences that recall some of the zanier and more experimental elements of cartoons like Ren and Stimpy.

All that said, the character design definitely was an odd contrast with the hyper realistic natural backgrounds. The film opens with a shot of flowing water. It is definitely a shot across the bow and a mission statement, the animators saying "See how that looks? We can do anything."

There was a definitely a Lion King vibe to a lot of the film, both due to some of the death and action scenes as well as the way in that it was quite frank about the fact that animals eat each other.

The voice cast all do a great job, particularly and predictably Sam Elliot. Steve Zahn was also a great addition.


Overall I liked the movie very much but I didn't quite love it as much as I did Inside Out. That's not a sleight against this film. It is itself a benchmark and an achievement for animation though less so for it story. The story is well told though one told pretty often. Your mileage may vary.

8/10

Side note, Pixar desperately needs to get away from the whole "characters get flung far away, have to get back plot."

 

[Drizzle]

I caught this yesterday. To me, it seemed like a bunch of Disney movies thrown in a blender. Some Lion King here, some Jungle Book there. It felt more like a traditional Disney movie than a Pixar one (not that it's a bad thing), but the animation was stunning. I liked it well enough to get emotional at the ending, but it wasn't as good as Inside Out. The Good Dinosaur is more of a middle of the road Pixar film, way below Toy Story and Up but much better than Cars and Monsters University.

 

[redhawk23]

The movie does almost nothing with its advertised premise "what if dinosaurs survived?" Basically the world makes no sense. At all. Not just in terms of the fact that humans likely would never have evolved but also that there are tons of other mammals including buffalo. Dinosaurs are essentially the people of this reality, humans being more like wolves. All other animals are treated just as animals. But then there are birds, just normal birds but then also talking person-Raptors. You get no sense of a dinosaur society or anything because it is centered around a single family homestead surrounded by wilderness. The film is pretty much just a western in which the characters are arbitrarily dinosaurs. The film could just as easily be about a human boy and not a single thing would change.

 

[:eek:]

"Good Dinosaur" To Be Pixar's First Flop?

By Garth Franklin Monday December 7th 2015 03:20PM
After sixteen films, Pixar might finally be facing one of its first misfires with Variety reporting that the recently released "The Good Dinosaur" is "shaping up to be Pixar's first box office failure."
With a production budget of $200 million and a further $150 million spent on marketing, analysts have indicated the film has to make $500 million at the global box-office to break even theatrically.
At present, the film has made just $131.3 million globally and is already fading faster than Pixar's other fare in the markets it has already opened in. Scoring soft reviews, it also opened to just $39.1 million in its initial weekend before dropping by more than 60% in its second weekend. Most Pixar's fall less than 50% in the same period.
MKM Partners analyst Erik Handler says: "It's not resonating like a typical Pixar film. It's on a path where they're going to need home entertainment to drive profitability. Usually with Pixar, by the time they've gone through the first [release] window, they're in the black."
At this point the film is lookling unlikely to pass the $400 million mark, which would make it the company's lowest grossing film since 1998's "A Bug's Life". However, there's still several major markets left to open including much of Asia and Oceania, but a Chinese release date has yet to be secured.
The film's merchandising and home entertainment sales should make up for the shortfall, and the film's fate stands in direct contrast to Pixar's "Inside Out" which sits atop many critics list and has amassed over $850 million worldwide.

 

[CB Fan]

Sad to see this film not doing so well, I wonder why it's not capturing people's interest.

 

[DaddlerTheDalek]

It was good. Not perfect but good.

 

[hobo123]

Sad to see this film not doing so well, I wonder why it's not capturing people's interest.

I still haven't seen it, but just from the trailers alone, it looks like too familiar. A mix between Dinosaur and Croods

 

[mclay18]

Exactly. People expect Pixar to deliver, and it's not living up to audiences' expectations.

 

[Octoberist]

With Brave and The Good Dinosaur, I wonder how it would've been if they just stuck with the original directors? Even if they ended up being failures, they would've been interesting failures that came from a sincere place.

I know Pixar movies constantly get reworked, but the movies with the more reworked stuff in the later stage (almost with a clean slate) that worked well was Ratatouille. Bird's involvement was interesting because the movie never felt like a stitched up Frankenstein of ideas.

 

[marty mcfly]

I had a hard time with this one. As many people have said, it looked gorgeous, but the contrast between the photo-realistic landscapes and the bizarre character design gave me an "off" feeling the whole time.

It seemed like visuals trumped storytelling as well, because it was extremely predictable. I don't mind predictable stories but this is Pixar we're talking about. They made me care about a boy-scout befriending an elderly man using balloons to make his house fly, a rat that becomes a chef in Paris, a family of superheroes that aren't allowed to use their powers anymore, monsters that work for a company that collect children's screams as a power source, and most recently, 5 key emotions inside a young girl's head trying to figure out why she's been so sad lately... I'm not alone in saying that by this point, the public expects Pixar to deliver on creativity and storytelling.

The Good Dinosaur was okay, but never felt like a Pixar film. Not particularly creative or innovative, a good voice cast but not a great one, forgettable characters and sequences, often even stooping to lowest-common-denominator style of jokes like falling down, getting hit in the groin, characters beating each other up, etc. (I'm looking at you, Dreamworks).

I think all-in-all, it just didn't feel like a Pixar film to me, and I think that's why I was ultimately so disappointed.

Grade: C

 

[chaseter]

Pixar's attempts at focusing on cash grabs has made their original entries fall short of their once greatness.

 

[I SEE SPIDEY]

I haven't seen the the film but the film disappointing at the box office isn't surprising to me because it never looked all that interesting. It looked okay I guess but there is no big hook. And the mix of ultra realistic and cartoony is strange. Also two Pixar movies in one year will dilude the brand.

 

[CB Fan]

Just saw the film and I had a good time with it. Watching it there were definitely times where I could see the influences of other films (Lion King especially) but I actually enjoyed that with this film. It's not at all Pixar's best but it deserves to be seen. There is a western sort of feel to it that I wasn't expecting and some moments will have you in your feelings.

 

[:eek:]

People Have Found Pixar’s Favorite Code Hidden in The Good Dinosaur

http://www.vulture.com/2016/01/people-have-found-the-good-dinosaurs-easter-egg.html?mid=imdb

 

[redhawk23]

A113 is also on a painting in Dean's house in Brad Bird's film the Iron Giant.