Monday, 12 October 2009

Latest screening: Toy Story 3D re-release


Is it possible for Toy Story (still Pixar's best film - and it has a heck of a competition - and one of the greatest animated films ever made) to be even better? Well, no - but it was fantastic to see it in 3D and back on the big screen.
Re-released in the UK for a one-week run a caught it twice. And it was glorious. I take nothing away from the 3D, it did look cool and on the first viewing it was almost impossible not to gaup for the first 5 minutes at the effect, but on reflection and the second viewing i realised it really only shows how brilliantly realised the Pixar worlds are already.
Many of the proponants of the new 3D talk about it being used to show depth and create a world instead of being a gimmick throwing things at you. The pluses and minuses of such an approach could not be more evident than here. This is film not made originally for 3D projection and therefore has none of the "gimmicks", so then the 3D is just adding the depth talked about. But then this is computer generated animation, it is and looks 3D regardless of the 3D projection. If the world has been thought out and created with care - and let's face it, it's Pixar so that's a given - then does the 3D projection add anything? I have to say no. If it had been re-released just as a standard re-release (like Disney always used to do with all their greats on a rota when i was a kid) i'd still have gone to see it twice.
But as said, it was still fun to see the effect applied even if it was largely unnecessary. For those who missed out look out for Toy Story 2 re-release coming to the UK on January 22. Let's hope now that these 3D prints have been paid for we'll see it cropping up back at cinemas a bit more often.

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