New at BOP: Review: Matrix Resurrections Movie Review: Moonfall Movie Reviews: Scream The #1 Movie in America November Forecast The Many Saints of Newark October Forecast New Trivia Question All site updates Share & Save   Tweet Print this column

Jason Barney: I saw it with my seven-year-old son on Saturday afternoon. Two of my brothers brought their kids. The women in our lives wanted to go and see the movie, too. The adults didn't leave the theater thinking "that was awesome", but the kids liked it. Was the movie bad? Was it as good as some of the other Pixar titles? The answer is "no" to both. I didn't see Cars 2, but that has become a punching bag of sorts because Pixar had one film that were not as good as all of the others. No, Brave wasn't Toy Story 3, or Up, or WALL-E, but that is okay.

It seems like this is a very similar situation to the early 1990s when Disney was on a hot streak. The Little Mermaid, The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin were all beloved by fans and left everyone drooling for more. Then Pocahontas came out and people weren't impressed. Then Hunchback, and again, a sigh. Quality is awesome and yes, Disney has been behind some truly memorable kids/family products. Brave may not have the magic of some of the other movies, but it wasn't bad.

Bruce Hall: Prior to Cars 2 I was well prepared for Pixar's inevitable First Disappointment. They can't all be gems, after all. I just wasn't prepared for HOW disappointing it would be, or how personally I would take it. So the best thing to me about Brave is the absence of indifference. Regardless of what you thought of the story or the execution, you'll have to admit that at least they tried. What galled me the most about Cars 2 was that it just didn't seem to give a damn. Brave may never be mentioned in conversation alongside the great ones, but it's also a different direction from Cars 2. That's a great start, as far as I'm concerned.

Felix Quinonez Jr.: To be honest, I was never that impressed by the trailers of this movie and I havent seen it yet. But someone I know, who shares my taste in movies, did see it and loved it. So I'm now pretty excited to see it myself.

Tony Kollath: 90% of the appeal for me was in the visuals. If the quality story had been anywhere in the neighborhood of how good it looked, we would have had a gem on our hands. Especially in some scenes earlier in the film, the animation in Brave was dazzling and surpasses anything else Pixar has created. Story-wise, the first half of the film hints that it will go in one direction. The second, though, makes a sharp left turn and really loses any good-will it had built up earlier.

Daron Aldridge: In a move not experienced in 10 years for me, I actually saw two movies in a single day this weekend but will be somewhat in the minority of opinions for both. I do agree with Tony that visuals are what drew me in at first and they did a remarkable of living up to what had been teased. On the other hand, the story itself felt more like a traditional Disney animated film and less like the unique, wholly creative stories that we have come to expect from Pixar. Is that a bad thing? I don’t think so but rather it just didn’t live up to the expectations that we have for Pixar, which is strange since their stories typically defy conventional story expectations. So, them going with the unexpected “old-fashioned” route is just as unexpected as a movie about toys, monsters, a cooking rat and a robot with a one-word vocabulary. I will agree that I wasn’t instantly smitten with the film when it was over like with Monsters, Inc. or Up but I still think it is a very good, entertaining film that is beautifully animated.

Continued:       1       2       3       4