Lightning McQueen is the hottest up-and-coming racecar in the Piston Cup circuit. He can back up all of his cocky swagger on the track but he has a hard time looking past his own greatness. After insulting his pit crew and pushing his hauler to the limit to reach Los Angeles first for a tie-breaking race for the Piston Cup championship, McQueen finds himself alone in a washed-up town called Radiator Springs. His arrival tears up the town’s street, for which the local authority sentences him to community service. While he works off his debt to the town, McQueen gets to know the colorful locals and learns a thing or two about the importance of teamwork as he preps for the big race.
From the glossy shine of Lightning McQueen to the dust and dirt of Radiator Springs, the animation in this movie represents another step forward by Pixar. At times, certain environments look almost photorealistic. The racing scenes in particular are exciting and they capture the energy and danger of the sport. The anthropomorphic characters all look good, even if they do play into stereotypes. The animators do a great job with how light reflects and bends off certain cars, while Mater really does look like he is made out of rusting metal. While most of the cars have the same textures, the filmmakers make up for it with the environments of the film.
The story, however, disappointed me. To me, the cocky-hotshot-gets-a-lesson-on-teamwork plot has been done enough times before that you can predict a lot of what’s coming. I’m okay with the winning-isn’t-everything message conveyed here because it is a valuable lesson for kids to learn. Otherwise, the overall message of Cars is be nice and work together. That’s a surprisingly simple and bland message for a Pixar film.
One serious problem with the film is its length. For a story about a racecar, Cars is anything but speedy. At almost two hours long, this is still the second-longest Disney and/or Pixar film ever made. Only Fantasia is longer. Most Disney films keep within the 80-90 minute range, though several have pushed the 100-minute mark lately. The Incredibles is only a minute shorter than Cars, but at least The Incredibles has more plot behind it and an antagonist. Cars is long on story and short on plot. There is no external antagonist. McQueen wants to get to the race and he needs to learn to get over himself. That could work in an 86-minute film. I think the lack of a true antagonist left the filmmakers to meander a little in order to bring all the story elements together in the end and that is a substantial problem.
Stories don’t always need a villain (case in point- Finding Nemo) but it is advisable to include one when your story is on the simple side. Cars could have used an active villain role, not just the other racecars he wants to beat for the championship. Introspection has worked well as an ingredient in Pixar films before but perhaps this film boasts too large a dose of it. Conflict is necessary, so making nice with the locals to get to the big race comes up very short. Several scenes are fun and exciting, and the whole film looks great but improved animation can’t save Cars from being the weakest Pixar film I’ve seen so far.
RATING: 3.5 out of 5
