Penned Thoughts

That a movie about talking toys could be enjoyable is a no-brainer. That a movie about talking toys could address weighty existentialist themes in a poignant fashion, and that audiences could come to love these characters and sympathize with their plights — well, who told Pixar they could do that? To make action scenes that are genuinely thrilling and suspenseful, even though we know everything’s going to turn out OK in the end — who would have thought that was even possible? I see action movies all the time whose flesh-and-blood characters never convince me they’re in any real danger, and here I am wide-eyed with giddy tension over the fate of some toys — and not even actual toys, but cartoon drawings of toys!