DTX120: #48 - Brave

12/2/12

7/27/12

I have a new least favorite Pixar movie.

Which, being that it is a Pixar movie, doesn't mean it's bad straightaway. It's just unremarkable, apart from Merida's crazy, stringy red hair. The backgrounds and locations all look wonderful, but the story looks recycled. Pixar used to make extremely witty, funny, creative movies but this one is none of those things. It's like a cross between How to Train Your Dragon and Tangled, except not as thrilling as the former or as funny/moving as the latter.

What really surprises me is the lack of a sharp script, something virtually every Pixar film has had, even Cars (I haven't seen Cars 2). What we get here is pretty standard "young girl doesn't want to do what her parents want" stuff. Mother is good, father is a buffoon (though a kindly one). I guess it's nice that she at least has a nuclear family. If this were a Disney film, one of the parents would be dead. In this movie, one of them just turns into a bear. I'll give it this, a couple of times I thought I knew where the story was going and it surprised me. But the humor is too broad - there's a lot of "woman who has become a bear is clumsy and knocks over stuff" and "prankster younger brothers hooked dad's leg to the table so he knocks over stuff" humor. Basically lots and lots of things get knocked over, which is not funny.

Everything about this movie feels rote, recycled, calculated. Again, none of it is awful really, and it's above average for a kids' movie. Just barely, though. I liked the scene where the witch's cauldron acts as an automated answering system, and I will admit the final fight had some power to it. However, once that was done the film returned to trite moralizing and shoehorning in the title. With the exception of the technical credits which are outstanding, this is a weak effort. 5.5/10

Pixar ranking

Toy Story
Ratatouille
The Incredibles
Toy Story 3
Wall-E
Toy Story 2
Up
Monster's Inc
Finding Nemo
A Bug's Life
Cars
Brave

Posted Dec 2, 2012, 5:45 PM UTC