Review of The Good Dinosaur (2015) by Kenneth E — 04 Mar 2016

Whatever you truly think about "The Good Dinosaur," it will be ultimately remembered best as Pixar's first financial failure. That's right. The self-proclaimed King of CG toon studio just put out their first box office flop; there are several reasons why it misfired.

First, the story was so slim it was practically nonexistent. Arlo the apatosaurus gets lost. He be-friends a weird puppy who happens to be a human. He then embarks on a long adventure to find the Great Valley, I mean, his homestead. That is pretty much it. The story, which incorporates elements of the classic American Western did not make me go "wow" but instead made me go "Why?" Did audiences need to see T-Rexes acting like Cowboys? Did we need to see a human boy be portrayed as Lassie? Did we need to see cattle-wrangling raptors and dinosaurs harvesting corn? How did Arlo's dad build the grain silo anyways? And, to paraphrase Ian Malcolm from Jurassic Park: "we do expect to see dinosaurs in this dinosaur [movie]?" What we mostly saw were birds, buffaloes, and small mammalian critters. I wanted more dinosaurs.

Second big problem about the film:

The world portrayed in "The Good Dinosaur" was so ridiculous it could not possibly exist, giving me strong vibes of the confusing world of Pixar's "Cars." The action within this world was a series of antics, and it would have functioned much better as a multi-part web toon series than one full-length film. As it stands, "The Good Dinosaur" felt so... Episodic.

Third big problem about the film:

The animation was absolutely ridiculous. It is hilarious that leading up to this film, the only positive thing Pixar praised about the film was the revolutionary CG techniques used to render the backgrounds. The overall feel was as mis-matched as "Finding Nemo," where goofy characters stick out like sore thumbs against realistic backgrounds. "The Good Dinosaur" takes this mis-matched feeling to a whole new level of stupidity: backgrounds are now 100% photorealistic.... And the characters? Glorified pool toys. Every second Arlo moved through the very-real landscape, I was worried he would step on a photorealistic sharp pebble or thorny bush and pop his PVC.

Now, despite all this critical backlash I've brought to the table, why do I generously give three stars to this film?

Characters.

This film had sympathetic characters that kept me interested, which is something I can't say about "Brave," "Monsters University" and "Up." While the characterization was not handled even a tenth as well as the protagonists of "Inside Out," I felt for Arlo and his struggles. I rooted for his success, and thought his motivation was sincerely played out. Best of all, Arlo felt human (which may seem like a ridiculous statement, but think about: dinosaurs are the dominant species and humans are the animals in this weird weird world.) Arlo was not some glorified male character who pushes through everything to get to the top. He fails as often as he wins. He gets scared. He shows fear. He gets sick. He tries his hardest. Just like Alanis Morissette once sang: "You live you learn, you love you learn, you cry you learn, you lose you learn." As much as I thought the photorealistic backgrounds were unnecessarily detailed, the natural elements was the real villain of this movie, and it was a huge threat to Arlo's well-being; the rainstorms, flash floods, and cold nights were as imposing as any evil villain in any typical Disney film.

(I award special points to that triceratops. That guy was the highlight character of the film and I longed to see more than two minutes of him. In fact, that entire wacky sequence was the highlight of the film for me.).

In the end, I had one last nagging observation about it all: "Sanjay's Super Team," the brilliant short film that preceded "The Good Dinosaur" should have been the feature-length film. This brief, but wild, animated treat about a young Indian boy's imagination of Hindu superheroes showed far more potential for a 90-plus minute movie than the film audiences actually got.