Is this the best Pixar movie?

Every summer I ask myself this question, and I'm growing tired of it.

Pixar knows how to make a good movie and their latest offering, Up, is funnier than Toy Story, as thrilling as the The Incredibles, and more heartbreaking than Finding Nemo.

I absolutely adored this movie, but while watching these charming characters trek through breathtaking South American vistas, I came to a somewhat sad realization... Much like Up's hero Carl, the Pixar formula for making a good movie is starting to grow old.

This is not to say that Up is a predictable, paint-by-number movie. The characters are far from formulaic: here we have a 78 year-old man as the action hero and a egg-shaped Asian-American boyscout as his sidekick. Pixar riffs on the tired old talking-animal cliche by including Dug, a hilariously realistic dog whose thoughts are translated to English through a nifty electro-collar. Did I mention the 10-foot bird? Mix a Toucan with an Ostrich and you'll have a pretty good idea of what Kevin looks like. Like all the other Pixar movies, the characters in Up are so fun and interesting that they could carry just about any story and they do so with ease.

The action set pieces are breathtaking, the gags are genuinely funny, and the tenderness is real.
Up is a culmination of all things good about Pixar movies executed with a honed precision developed over the last decade with their stable of critically acclaimed hits.

I believe that this is Pixar's best movie, and with that being said, I hope it's the last of it's kind.

How many more movies can Pixar make about a misunderstood, unappreciated hero? How many more dimwitted but endearing sidekicks can they dream up? Part of what made Pixar's first feature-length movie, Toy Story, so good was that it was totally different from what Disney was doing at the time. Sure the flashy computer animation sucked you in, but it was the characters, humor, and overall flavor that really set it apart. Now, I'm afraid that Pixar movies are becoming too much like, well...Pixar movies.

I'm hoping that in the future, Pixar trail-blazes into undiscovered territories, like the characters in Up.

Of course this will have to be after Toy Story 3 and Cars 2.

:(

Note to reader: This is a review of the dvd of the 1986 animated film, not the manga or animated tv series.

The movie:
I first saw this movie in the early 90's when I was a little kid and, up until watching this particular film, all I knew of animation was what I was getting from Disney and Saturday morning cartoons. Kids stuff. Fist of the North Star was an awaking. You might even say it was a rude awakening, or even a bloody awakening. I didn't know that they made cartoons with cursing and gore and violence. But these so called "adult" elements only made me want to continue watching it even more. I thought the movie was awesome from the start.
This movie is ridiculous. And I mean that in the best possible way. It's action entertainment at its best. This film even claims, at least on the cover, to be "the most violent, action packed animated film of all time". I don't know if this claim is entirely true but the movie is pretty damn violent. It has a lot of obscenely muscular dudes beating the crap out of bad guys with only their fists, causing the heads, chests, and limbs of said bad guys to explode in an orgy of blood, guts and bone. Its even got men stabbing people not with knives or swords, but with their fingers. That's right, with their fingers. This kind of stuff appeals to my id.
Another way of describing The Fist of the North Star is that it falls under the category of being so bad it's good. I like this category, personally. It's got bad voice acting, bad dialogue, bad drawings, very limited animation in some (most) parts, and it's very 80's. The 80's, as some of you might know, is now regarded as a sort of social stigma from which many are trying to ignore and forget. I don't have that obligation because I didn't grow up in the 80's.
I don't feel it really necessary to go into specifics about the plot because I don't really remember this movie for its story. Just know that it touches on many themes and plot devices that we're all familiar with: "good vs. evil", "love", "betrayal", "lust for power", and "the children are our future". Nothing new under the sun. Although, I will mention this, this film does have somewhat of an atypical and surprising ending which possesses a bit of an emotional punch for me. It's very touching in a way.
So if you like exaggerated, unrealistic, obscene, bloody violence, if you love the ridiculous, if you adore crap, good crap, check out Fist of the North Star. In stores on dvd, finally, now!

The dvd/ blu-ray:
This won't take long to write about because there really isn't a lot to write about in regards to special features. It's got character profiles, image gallery, and some trailers. That's it. Nothing really intriguing to me personally, but I didn't buy the dvd for the special features.
The image quality looked surprisingly good for a 23 year old animated film that probably, at least in the western part of the world, not a lot of people know or care about. I wonder how many final prints of the film survived the last nearly three decades? I didn't notice any signs of age, there's no dust or scratches to be found. The audio itself sounds a little dated but that's because it is dated. Overall, though, a solid and pleasing aesthetic experience.

I've seen Star Trek twice now, once in a "regular" theater and once in an IMAX theater. The particular IMAX theater that I watched the movie in had recently been equipped with a new digital projector, the old one was a 70mm projector. Three things really bothered me about this transition. The image on the digital was smaller, blurrier, and had the rainbow that DLP projectors are notorious for. This made for a mediocre movie going experience, though I doubt many will notice. My sentiments were only reinforced by a recent /film article in which quotes the IMAX group as saying that 2% of ticket buyers would even notice the difference. True or not, IMAX digital isn't quite up to snuff, I've seen it myself. But for those who haven't check out this comparison pic also posted on /film. The little one is the digital format and the large one is the 70mm.

Nothing beats the size, color, and clarity of the old 70mm. What does IMAX intend to do about the growing number of people that notice this glaring discontinuity. AMC is upgrading to 2k soon so they'd better hurry.

It doesn't get any more sad than this...

Wayne Allwine, the voice of Mickey Mouse for the last 3 decades, has passed away.

I was always fascinated with Mr. Allwine. I often wondered what it would be like to be the voice of one of the worlds most famous pop icons while still being able to live life anonymously. It should be noted that this man was an extremely hard and dedicated worker. Think of the various commercials, shows, movies, theme park rides, video games, albums, etc... over the last 30 so years that have Mickey Mouse on them. Every single one of them featuring this amazing man's voice.

Wow...

Our thoughts go out to his family and his wife Russi Taylor who is the voice of Mickey's love, Minnie Mouse.

Hears hoping that this week a candle is lit at Disneyland in memory of this voice acting legend.

I realize that I'm (we're) biased; some things get more coverage than others, etc. Pixar's Up being one of those. In fact if you'll notice the post directly preceding this one you'll notice a loving picture of one of Carl in his youth, This doesn't really have any journalistic merit, it's about fan appreciation, or in this case adoration. Up looks great and with only 9 days to go until its release I'm more excited than ever. So I hope you'll excuse another Up post, or link rather, and remember that we're all just fans at this site. That being said, you are more than welcome to join us.

Anyway, The NY Times has a great article titled "Well-Rounded Boy, Meet Old Square" which is a description of some of the dynamics of the film, It's a good read if you're interested in this film and it will only reaffirm your anticipation. Also, there's a pretty cool interactive feature here. Be sure to check them both out.

He looks so handsome.

The District 9 preview looks good, maybe not as good as Cloverfield but that's because it's a different breed. It's more of a thoughtful Science Fiction experience, think Star Trek (the original, mind you) as opposed to Star Wars--thoughtful versus eventful. The aliens look crude enough to be believable, you'll never confuse them with cgi even if they are. But more interesting than the hype for the trailer and the obvious parallels to Apartheid in South Africa, is the original short by Neil Blomkamp. Its documentary aesthetic is somehow accentuated by its gorgeous cinematography, proving that the two can be married. Blomkamp, as you may remember, at one point was attached to the Halo movie might actually be setting himself up for another go at it. Overall, I'm pretty excited about the movie's realistic approach to a fantastic subject.

What's this? A movie studio adapting a successful novel into a film? It happened. Again! This time the book is Cormac McCarthy's Pulitzer Prize winning story, "The Road". I read the book in early March of last year (it's terrifc, by the way) and was excited to hear that it was being made into a motion picture. Judging by the trailer I think we got some potential here. Head on down 'the road' to your local movie theater on Oct. 16 and check it out.

Here are some pictures of characters from two of Disney's upcoming feature-length animated films. See if you can guess which one is from Pixar's new movie and which one is an in-house Walt Disney Animation Studios production.


Okay, so that was easy. Obviously the 3D character is Pixar and the...Wait a minute...Is that a hand drawn 2D Disney character?

In case you haven't heard, Disney is attempting a 2D animation revival with the Princess and the Frog, recruiting many of the top talents that honed their craft on such animated "classics" such as The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, and Hercules.

For their first 2D comeback flick, Disney has decided to take a cue from Dreamworks animated films, thus filling their movie with "edgy", smirk-prone characters as opposed to the charming outcast characters from Pixar's roster.

Going back to the two characters in the pictures. Which one would you rather have a stuffed animal of? Date-rapist Frog Prince, or the dim-witted yet unconditionally loyal and loving Dug?

In this jam-packed episode of the Gamebino Podcast we discuss captivate 09 with bigapple3am, otherwise known as Andy. Lots of insight in this extra long episode. Enjoy!

Gamebino Episode 7

So, don't click if you wanna stay a spoiler virgin.

This has just come to my attention: Terminator Salvation is PG-13. What? Can they do that? Sorry hard R fans. Looks like Warner Bros. is actually trying to make some big money with this one. But I guess it makes sense. The movie industry is a business, a fact unfortunate for those who like consistent quality in movies, and a business is always looking to make a profit. And you're not as likely to make a big profit if a portion of your audience is under 17 and can't even pay to see the movie because of an R rating. It's sad, I know. But they can always sneak in. As they always do anyway.
If this trend continues, will we be seeing even less big budget, sci-fi, action, hard R motion pictures? We got Watchmen, right?

With E3 less than a month away, Microsoft has promised that their presentation at the trade show will "completely transform how people think about home entertainment".

Word on the street is that the long rumored XBOX360 motion-control interface will finally be unveiled to the public through the Zcam, "the first low-cost, consumer videocamera that can capture video with depth information and probably the first real challenger to Nintendo's Wiimote"

Here is footage of the Zcam in action from CES.




The technology looks incredibly promising, but is Microsoft willing to commit to motion-controls this far into the 360's lifespan, and at what price?

Again, E3 is just around the corner..

This video raises many questions.



1. Is this child's (playing the demo) generation so far removed from classic arcade-style game play that he is totally oblivious as to how to properly "kick shell".

2. This footage reveals that the core game play is not a pixel per hit-box remake in the vein of R-Type Dimensions. In this video Leonardo has 8 different directions to slash, bash and slam The Foot into submission from. This re-imagining appears to be a tad faster than the original JAMMA jam. Will these alterations to the game mechanics make or break TiT?

3. The internet is buzzing with excitement for this game. Why hasn't an official announcement, complete with press pack (pics, trailer, etc...) hit the web yet? They are probably keeping their cards close to the chest because, A. they are letting us do the hype for them leading up to an E3 reveal, or B. the game may actually, well...Suck?

Expect to hear something from Ubisoft and Konami in the coming weeks.

Some amazing screen shots of a new TMNT game surfaced on Joystiq today confirming the existence of the game Turtles in Time existence. It looks amazing, and reminds me a bit of Street Fighter 4(simple backgrounds, candy colors).

I took the liberty of straightening the image out to get a more clear impression of what it might look like.


This is all part of a 25th anniversary road trip designed to rekindle nostalgia in the old franchise and bring in some new blood. It seems to be working. I'm officially interested.

BTW, Adam posted some about this at Blast Heroes.

P.S. Is that Jessica Simpson as April O'neil?