Dinosaur (2000)

If you ever wondered what the adult dinosaurs were doing during The Land Before Time, here’s your answer. A massive and expensive undertaking that features real backgrounds and CGI dinosaurs, this film aimed to be something of an industry game changer. It may have hit pay dirt, but this film understandably lands with something between a thud and a flop on Disney’s all-time best list.

A family of Cretaceous-era lemurs adopt an Iguanodon hatchling abandoned during a Carnotaurus attack. As an adult, Aladar and his adopted family flee extinction when an asteroid collides with the Earth, causing widespread devastation. Herbivores of all species band together in a quest to find the Nesting Place, a valley unscathed by the recent cataclysm. Romance and conflict arises between the different personalities in the make-shift herd as they struggle for survival against the elements as well as roaming carnivores.

Survival, a mix of dinosaurs, and a rumored safe haven- that is the exact same framework as The Land Before Time, leaving Dinosaur with quite the uphill climb. The folks at Disney also don’t do themselves any favors by cramming this film full of cuteness, cheesy jokes, and a whole lot of clichéd ‘together we can do this’ rhetoric. Predictable as the film may be, it is not a total lost cause.

At times, the visuals in this film blew me away. After doing some digging, I found out that Disney filmed many exotic real world locales for backgrounds and superimposed their CGI dinosaurs into it. That explains why some sequences looked so impressive for a CGI film- it wasn’t all CGI. The blending of the two works very well for long shots (aka wide shots) with not a lot of action. When there is a lot going on or a shot is framed pretty tight, the visuals really show their age. I think Disney was onto something pretty cutting edge and it is a shame that it still had some kinks.

There are some curiosities with this film that make me wonder how much better it could have been. Only the herbivores have voices and personalities. The carnivores are just angry monsters on a rampage. Could the film be more effective if the carnivores talked as well, or if the herbivores also lacked voices? Also, the dinosaur nerd in me can’t help but wonder if different species of herbivorous dinosaurs really lived in tandem as the pre-cataclysm scenes depict. The dino-geek in me does, however, commend the film for keeping non-Cretaceous animals out of the film. An Iguanodon makes for a very vanilla protagonist, but at least he is surrounded by era-accurate dinosaurs.

Dinosaur is a difficult film to place amongst Disney’s other animated features because it is so very different. It completely splits away from any of the Disney formulas, which should make it refreshing. All of Disney’s other PG-rated films have suffered for one reason or another but Dinosaur feels like its biggest flaw is that it came too soon. With all the advancements in CGI imagery even within the five years following its release, Dinosaur could have been the spectacle its filmmakers were hoping for. It would take a few re-writes and tweaks, but the potential is in there for something great.

RATING: 3.25 out of 5

A Bug's Life (1998)

This is the kind of film you get when you combine groundbreaking technology with a story that’s been told a few too many times. There is nothing wrong with A Bug’s Life, really. In fact, it stands tall as one of the better non-musical films in Disney’s arsenal of family entertainment. And yet, in only Pixar’s second full-length computer-animated film, enough of the freshness we felt in Toy Story seems to have disappeared.

Flik is tired of being a follower, which is difficult for a member of an ant colony. His creativity, inventiveness, and unfortunate clumsiness make him stand out from his peers in a bad way. When his latest invention draws the ire of greedy and hostile grasshoppers, the colony is threatened with extinction. Flik sets off to assemble a team of warriors to defend his colony, but his creativity is put to the test when all he can recruit is a team of misfit circus bugs.

A Bug’s Life has plenty of beautiful animation to its credit. It also boasts a bunch of amusing and colorful characters. The story, however, is weak. A group of misfits band together to accomplish amazing feats? Yeah, I’ve seen about a dozen or more films with the exact same plot, especially with children’s films. Because the whole story structure is recycled, it’s not hard to predict most of how this film plays out.

As many authors will tell you, however, it is not about the destination, but the journey itself. Fortunately, this film has plenty of easily-digested ingredients. What the story lacks in freshness, Pixar makes up for with another dose of visual wonder. Toy Story gave us a look at what our homes look to our toys. A Bug’s Life takes us outside and even closer to the ground. The attention to detail and exaggeration of such micro details reminds me of Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. It is clear that Pixar was not about to rest on their laurels in this department, which is very encouraging.

Flik and the rest of the ants are pretty bland. The grasshoppers are mindless drones, save for their leader, Hopper (voiced by Kevin Spacey). He is intimidating at times but is understandably over-the-top with his rage. The real gems are the circus bugs. Each one has their own unique personality and that personality shows through in their physical appearance. While over-anthropomorphizing non-human characters became a problem in several computer-animated films released in the past decade, Pixar does it right here. Characters retain enough of their insect nature to be believable as bugs.

The story may leave you wanting more if you focus on it too much but if you pull back your magnifying glass just a little bit, there is no reason not to enjoy this film. Its quirks and jokes are good fun for all ages. It lacks the wow actor of Toy Story and some later Pixar films, but A Bug’s Life is certainly no sophomore slump.

RATING: 3.5 out of 5