Toy Story 3 is Pixar’s piece de resistance. Coupling the originality of the first Toy Story with the pathos of the second one, Toy Story 3 is a joy to experience, beginning to end. Exiting the theater, I did not see one dry eye, or one face unsmiled.
After a rousing intro re-establishing the characters, we are placed in the present: Andy (John Morris) is going off to college at a crossroads with his toys. He elects to take Woody (Tom Hanks) to college with him, but leaves his other toys as attic material. Due to a maternal mix up, the toys [Jessie (Joan Cusack), Buzz (Tim Allen), Rex (Wallace Shawn), Mr. (Don Rickels) and Mrs. (Estelle Harris) Potato-Head, Hamm (John Ratzenberger), Slinky (Blake Clark) and Barbie (Jodie Benson)] end up at Sunnyside Daycare, which is run by Lotso (Ned Beatty), a strawberry smelling bear and Ken (Michael Keaton), Barbie’s beau. At first this seems perfect: a place where kids never grow up. However, all is not as it seems: Sunnyside is run like a prison, and the toys must break out to get back, but get back to whom?
Toy Story 3 does a good job shedding unnecessary characters from previous movies and integrating new ones. The flashback sequence instantly provides an insight for the audience to the toys and their relationship with Andy: each one plays an important role in the adventures Andy creates in his mind, thus eliminating the need to watch the previous films. It also mentions other important characters from the past (like Bo Peep) and uses their absence to quickly set up the stakes. When they toys arrive at Sunnyside, Lotso is given a Shakespearean backstory that sympathizes the villain. Director Lee Unkrich and Screenwriter Michael Arndt know that not everyone in the audience will see the first 2 Toy Stories before this one, so they set up the movie so you don’t have to have prior knowledge; however, if you have seen the first two, the movie works on a deeper level and is just as effective if not more so.
The tonal balance is handled effortlessly in Toy Story 3. The transitions in emotional resonance are usually subtle but effective and build upon one another as the story moves on. The sheer joy from the flashback is greater and a little sad because of the melancholy of the present in the next scene. That sadness is an undercurrent of the Sunnyside story along with playful menace. The dire circumstances culminate in the final act of the Sunnyside story that touches the heart in the simplicity of the toys’ gesture to one another. The final fifteen minutes is hard to describe, but there is a ubiquity to it. Kids and adults alike will look back on the times they had a connection to a toy. Kids will feel happiness, but adults will feel something much more: nostalgia, euphoria, understanding. An emotion that complicated rarely connects with an audience, but Toy Story 3 finds something in the final fifteen minutes that will resonate with every audience member.
Lots of credit goes to the voice actors, who are all pretty stellar. There are 4 standouts. Tom Hanks is winning as everyone’s favorite cowboy; Woody has the toughest decision to make and it is present in every word Hanks says. Ned Beatty does a fantastic job hiding menace behind a calm and welcoming demeanor. This combination makes Lotso more tragic than hated. And finally, Michael Keaton and Jodi Benson do a fun rat-at-at as Ken and Barbie, the star-crossed lovers. They get most of the funniest scenes of the film, especially Keaton.
There are adults out there who are convinced that animated films are an inferior art form. That they pander to children with bright lights and easily digestible stories that adults will be bored with. Toy Story 3 has some of those elements, but it carries with it a deep understanding of what makes a toy so special to a child, making the film deeper than more “mature” films in the world today. Much like the Grinch, your heart will grow three sizes after watching Toy Story 3, and make you want to go into your attic, grab your old toys, and just say to them “Thank you.”