Kris Mason - Reel 2 Real
Kris Mason has been a published film critic in the Valley for over six years now. He became a member of the Phoenix Film Critics Society in 2003.
You can read Kris's monthly column at www.nearbynews.com.
Here is the latest article...
Would the Real Best Animated Feature Please Stand Up?
The Oscars are a huge blow to me every year. One person can’t be that wrong, that many times, so consistently. I still can’t help but think I’m right. So let’s retrace my steps.
I have always said that Pixar was incapable of failure. Last year, after screening Wall-E, I thought I had been proven wrong. Don’t get me wrong, if Wall-E could have been a 45 minute silent film about a cassette deck who falls in love with an iPod, I would have supported the Oscar nod. But Wall-E got messy; it got people involved; even the environmental message got distorted. The mighty Pixar struck out.
And the critics went wild. Triumph! Masterpiece! Genius! Please. There were people who wanted it nominated for Best Picture because of its message. What?! If you haven’t seen Wall-E, the next part will make no sense; I might spoil the ending.
Here is the lesson I learned from Wall-E. People are environmental train wrecks; but, people have the technology to walk away from their mistakes and let robots clean up their mess while they go off into space and become more useless. People in space have the technology to create bigger messes and create bigger robots to clean them up; but, instead of waking up and learning from our mistakes, let’s just dump our mistakes out into space. Then, let’s take our blind ignorance back to the scene of the crime and believe we can start over growing pizza plants.
I give the people on the ship three days before they get back on, head off into space again and forget their whole, “growing pizza,” ordeal. There was nothing about Wall-E that I liked after the 45-minute mark; and I certainly don’t need my Global Warning agenda brought to me by the folks at Disney.
There was an animated feature last year that I would have loved to have seen take the Oscar home. The Tale of Despereaux, from the beloved children’s author Kate DiCamillo, screened to critics and opened in theaters after the deadline for national critics “Best Of” lists. Basically, it arrived to the party late and wasn’t eligible for door prizes. That’s a crime, because Despereaux was flawless.
With themes of love, loss, compassion, virtue as well as believing in yourself and following your dreams, The Tale of Despereaux features the most voice talent of any animated film. Matthew Broderick, Dustin Hoffman, Emma Watson, Tracey Ullman, Kevin Kline, William H. Macy, Stanley Tucci, Christopher Lloyd, Sigourney Weaver, Frank Langella and Richard Jenkins (both Oscar nominated best actors this year) round out the cast.
If you missed The Tale of Despereaux in theaters, as all critics and Academy members did, you’re in luck. The DVD release date is April 7th. Buy it don’t rent it. That way your kids can compare it to the book.
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