Originally Posted By AutoPost This topic is for Discussion of <a href="http://www.LaughingPlace.com/Latest-ID-76674.asp" target="_blank"><b>Latest: HuffPost: Cartoon Expert Michael Barrier Decries Pixar, Computers</b></a> <p>Animation historian and critic Michael Barrier describes the Toy Story series as "mechanical, manipulative series of films that don't capture the magic of the yesteryear."</p>
Originally Posted By mawnck One of the most exasperating things about Michael Barrier is how often he's right. His knowledge in the field of animation and his attentiveness to getting facts right in his books and articles is indisputable, and he's seen way more animation than you probably have. His biography of Walt Disney, for instance, is a heck of a lot better, and more accurate, than Neil Gabler's much celebrated (and overrated) book. That having been said, there are times that it really seems he doesn't really enjoy animation all that much anymore, and this is one of them. I think he's off base here in accusing Pixar movies of being manipulative, especially in comparison to the earlier classics. If the Married Life sequence in Up is manipulative, then what the heck is the Baby Mine sequence in Dumbo? That's what good movies are supposed to do! He was pretty impressed with Tangled, at least in its technical excellence if not its storytelling: <a href="http://www.michaelbarrier.com/Commentary/Tangled/Tangled.html" target="_blank">http://www.michaelbarrier.com/...led.html</a>
Originally Posted By Manfried What an exceptionally cliche ridden piece of claptrack. Sorry, but the guy is deliberately writing the anti-Pixar view to get people to read.
Originally Posted By ecdc >>That's what good movies are supposed to do!<< Yeah, I never got the "manipulative" criticism, whether applied to animation or anything else. It's often levied at Steven Spielberg. I've got no beef with not liking Spielberg, but give me more than manipulative - every movie is designed to make the audience feel a certain way at certain stages in the film. As for Pixar...well now he's just being grumpy (the emotion, not the deliberately manipulative character in the Walt Disney film). Maybe he feels like Armond White is getting too much attention.
Originally Posted By basil fan I'm of two minds on this article. Some of it is spot-on, and some rather absurd. >>What you have instead in computer animation is a continuing elaboration on texture and surfaces and three dimensional space without anything comparable for characters. Absolutely true. >>in the opening montage of 'Up,' you're essentially being strong armed into shedding tears about Carl and Ellie.. to me, it was grotesquely sentimental and a lot of people were looking for an excuse to break into tears, and obviously this was for them. Can't agree with that. I found it charmingly sentimental. Star Wars Glitches <a href="http://www.whatsitsaglore.com/glitch/swglitch.html" target="_blank">http://www.whatsitsaglore.com/...tch.html</a>
Originally Posted By mawnck >>Sorry, but the guy is deliberately writing the anti-Pixar view to get people to read.<< Sigh. No, Manfried, he's for real. He's been writing about animation - with much the same tone - for decades. Well before Al Gore invented the internets. He watches Pixar movies and doesn't like them. There are actually people that do this. He liked "The Incredibles" BTW.
Originally Posted By ecdc >>There are actually people that do this.<< Credible people? Don't get me wrong, I've read a bit of Barrier's stuff and I know he's credible, I just don't understand this comparison between Pixar and earlier animation based on the medium it's created with. How that makes Pixar mechanical and hand drawn animation personal is beyond me. How anyone doesn't want Pinocchio (one of my favs) and think it's manipulative is beyond me. I know in listening to commentaries on Pixar films, they frequently give credit to one animator for bringing a specific character to life. And ironically, the one Pixar film he likes is made by someone who rails against the absurdity of focusing on the medium a film is created with, as if it's its own genre, instead of focusing on story, characters, etc. Barrier's of course entitled to his opinion, but so is someone who loved Transformers 2 and hated the Social Network. Those people can rarely back up those opinions in any meaningful way beyond how something "feels" to them.
Originally Posted By ecdc BTW, this line, "They are congratulating their audience for feeling these synthetic emotions and, to me, that's offensive." Offensive? Melodramatic much? I didn't realize Pixar was claiming to cure cancer or have discovered God. Definitely something to be "offended" about if you disagree with them.
Originally Posted By Manfried @mawnk I know he's for real. I just think this particular piece was hokey and targeted for a specific "anti-Pixar" audience. I mean "manipulated" come on. That is such a BS cliche used by critics when they don't have anything original to say. All movies manipulate you. So not a lot of original thinking on his part in this piece. Maybe he needs to go watch some movies with real people in them for a while.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>I just think this particular piece was hokey and targeted for a specific "anti-Pixar" audience.<< I can't argue with that, but I 'spect the HuffPo article author has a lot to do with it.
Originally Posted By SeventyOne Michael Barrier has posted a response to a lot of the online criticism: <a href="http://www.michaelbarrier.com/index.html" target="_blank">http://www.michaelbarrier.com/index.html</a> I still don't know that I buy the "emotional manipulation" argument that he makes (or at least don't agree that that is something new), but his case is a little clearer. Interesting that he seems to hold "Tangled" in higher regard than most Pixar movies.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan >>By contrast, Carl and Ellie in Up's opening minutes are puppets, they're dolls; to weep over them is to wallow in sentimentality, in what has been called "an outpouring of emotion unimpeded by thought."<< That Pixar's artists were able to elicit such emotion, wordlessly mind you, is no more "manipulative" nor less sincere than the artists at Disney doing the same thing with Dumbo and countless other animated moments. In "Up" we are introduced to the bumbling Carl and the spunky Ellie as kids and then watch them spend their lives together – saving for a great adventure, and having to tap into those funds as life's little emergencies popped up along the way. In those few moments we experienced their lifetime of hopes, humor, love and loss. And you bet I sat there "wallowing in sentimentality" -- I was as much affected emotionally by those two characters and the ups and downs of their life as well as I was moved by the beauty and skill with which that short portion of the film was created, crying over two things at once really, the way someone might be moved by a beautiful piece of music expertly performed. That he enjoys the manipulation of Hitchcock and others more, well, that's fine, it's his preference. But it's a very weak argument and entirely subjective to suggest that his favorite manipulators are superior to other manipulators. Every film, every novel or business letter or web banner, every piece of music, every painting, sculpture, advertisement or motion picture is created with the goal of eliciting certain emotions in the audience, so every form of art and entertainment, in some way, is manipulative.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan And in regards to that sequence being "unimpeded by thought" I say bullfeathers to that, too. That sequence was expertly crafted and emotional threads of those moments resurfaced later in the film at key moments. The audience knew the worth and the value of the Ellie badge by the end of the movie. A great deal of thought was put into that sequence, and it left the audience with things to think about (such as what's most important in life, whether it's better to take adventures while you can as opposed to when you can truly afford to, and so forth.)
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan (Sorry to ramble. It's among my favorite film moments of all time, and so I get a little carried away in defense of it.)
Originally Posted By ecdc It's a good defense and assessment of an awfully weak argument by Barrier. Reading his response really does feel like reading Armond White. He makes little sense and he seems more interested in provoking than explaining. It's all a bit strange. He sounds like my grandpa complaining about cell phones for crying out loud. Maybe his next post can be on how manipulative the kids on his lawn are.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan >>He sounds like my grandpa complaining about cell phones for crying out loud.<< Really. I would bet that he finds the scenes of Snow White running in terror into the forest awesome, and the "When She Loved Me" sequence of TS2 manipulative. Both are expertly designed to elicit specific emotions, and both do exactly what they set out to do. The double standard is odd, but his inability to just own up to it is very, very odd.
Originally Posted By Evening Star Snow White's funeral scene is very emotional as well. It's raining, the animals are crying*, the dwarves are crying, the organ plays a mournful tune, and the candles make the scene appear hazy. No one says a word, only the organ and the sound of crying is heard. *Or it may just be the rain, but it is animated in a way to suggest tears.
Originally Posted By basil fan It is my opinion that the true purpose of art is to create emotion, to make the audience feel what the artist wants the audience to feel. Josie and the Pussycats <a href="http://www.whatsitsgalore.com/glitch/jpglitch.html" target="_blank">http://www.whatsitsgalore.com/...tch.html</a>
Originally Posted By Manfried From Barrier's response: "I think that's largely false. Certainly we go to certain kinds of movies in the expectation that we will be entertained by having our emotions manipulated. Hitchcock was expert at that sort of manipulation, but there was never anything hidden about what he was doing; the suspense in a good Hitchcock movie is as enjoyable as being worked over by an expert masseur. But there's nothing comparable going on in many of the best live-action films, and certainly not in the great Disney animated features." What a crock! That he has to write a response clearly shows his hand animation bias and anti-Pixar bias among other things. I think Barrier is learning that in the Internet age you can't get away with cheap shots any more, which is what his interview and responses are. It is sad to see someone who is supposed to be respected, as he clearly makes it sound like in his egotistical response, succumb to non-acceptance that he blew it big time.
Originally Posted By mawnck No one can accuse Barrier of not being egotistical, dat's fo sho. But you dismiss his opinions at your peril. He's a smart dude. I guess what he's saying is that the Married Life sequence relies more on the setting and the music and the situation to create its emotions, whereas in the hand-drawn stuff it's the animation of the actual characters. In other words, it's not the animation of Carl and Ellie themselves who are carrying the emotion of the scene, but the other "stuff." I guess my rebuttal to that would be "So?" (See, I'm a smart dude too.) To expand on that a bit, I think he's missing the forest for the trees. The objective is creating an emotional response in the audience, and the Married Life sequence did that masterfully ... so well, in fact, that almost nobody noticed that the rest of the movie wasn't really all that great. ;-) I'm not real sure how Barrier would've expected hand-drawn to do it any better. It's a different medium, with different strengths and weaknesses, so it would've been handled differently. Doesn't make Up inferior. It was Up's third act that did that.
