The Good Dinosaur

The Good Dinosaur is a perfectly acceptable animated film that has the misfortune of coming out less than six months after the masterful and emotional Inside Out.  That's not to say it doesn't stand out in any way.  This is probably the most beautiful movie Pixar has ever done, with a large array of photo-realistic backgrounds and settings.  It also has its share of heart-tugging moments.  But, if I must be honest, the movie just didn't captivate me.  I actually don't think it was supposed to.  This movie seems to have been made with the youngest animation fans in mind, not adults.  I still was able to enjoy the movie, but it never engaged me fully like the better films to come out of the studio.

In the world of this movie, the event that was supposed to wipe out the dinosaurs never happened.  Instead, the creatures have evolved somewhat and created a civilized society where there are farmers, ranchers, and even outlaws.  Try to picture dinosaurs acting out a John Ford Western, and you wouldn't be too far off.  I understand that the idea sounds silly on paper, but it kind of works in this movie, and I'll take it over yet another Jurassic World, where dinosaurs do nothing but act like threats in a video game.  In the film's early moments, we witness life on a farm for a family of Apatosauruses.  We see how they grow and store crops, plow the fields, and feed some of the livestock they keep on the farm.  These scenes hold the most imagination within the film, and honestly, I would have liked to see more.  On this family farm, we meet Poppa (voice by Jeffrey Wright) and Momma (Frances McDormand), as well as their three children.  The smallest of the three children, Arlo (Raymond Ochoa), serves as the hero of the story.  He will set out on a quest to battle his own fears, and learn to be the dinosaur that his proud Poppa knows he can be.

The story (credited to five different writers) is strictly by the book as far as Disney goes, with little Arlo facing a personal tragedy, and then being separated from the rest of the family when he is washed away by raging waters.  The timid little dinosaur must face the world alone for the first time if he wants to find his way home.  He's joined on his journey by a little cave boy that he names Spot.  The boy essentially acts like a dog throughout the film, panting happily when he wants to play, and snarling when predators are near.  It's a cute role reversal on the "boy and his dog" idea, having the dinosaur being the intelligent master of the two.  Arlo and Spot encounter a few threats along the way, such as a pack of pterodactyls and some violent storms.  But since this movie is mainly targeted at kids, it doesn't get too scary.  Most of the time the heroes are together is spent playing or bonding with each other.

I can imagine very young children (I'd say under 10) getting the most out of The Good Dinosaur.  Accompanying adults will have the gorgeous visuals to keep them entertained.  While the character designs are cute but certainly nothing new, the backdrops are some of the most stunningly realized ever seen in an animated film.  With its American West-inspired settings, we get to see lovely mountains against a vast sky, realistic water effects (both in rain, and rapid rivers and streams), and painstakingly realized grass and foliage that must have taken days to render and animate.  If it weren't for these visuals, I may have grown restless a few times, as the dialogue isn't as snappy as say Finding Nemo.  Arlo has the mind of a young child, and Spot doesn't talk at all, so there's not much in the way of conversation between the two.  The most interesting character to show up in the movie is a rugged and tough cowboy T-Rex voiced perfectly by Sam Elliott.  When he sits by the campfire and tells stories of his past battles and experiences, you almost wish the movie was about him.

If this review seems to be slanting a bit negative, it's not my intention.  This is a perfectly fine film, wonderful for kids, and pleasant for adults.  There is no complexity to it, and there's nothing wrong with that.  You just can't help but feel that this is not quite what it could have been when you look up the behind the scenes stories of the movie.  This was a very troubled production, with the original director being replaced, a large majority of the cast removed, and the script almost entirely rewritten multiple times.  Apparently, this was the movie that gave the studio the hardest time to put together.  I would say the final product that's up on the screen is admirable enough, but you can definitely see the signs of a a movie that's not quite the original vision of the filmmakers.  The opening moments in particular feel rushed, introducing characters whom we never see again for a majority of the film.  This is the kind of movie that leaves you wondering what got left out.

Still, The Good Dinosaur is a wonderful technical achievement, and is worth seeing on the big screen simply on that level if you are an adult animation fan.  You can chalk this up as a fine, but flawed effort from Pixar.  They will do a great movie again, very soon I am guessing.  As long as you don't walk into this one expecting the complexity and maturity of Inside Out, you'll have a fun time.  If you have kids, I'm sure seeing their reaction to this will be the best part of the movie.

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