#99 Toy Story

Toy Story (IMDB), #99 on AFI’s Top 100 movies, is a great example of what animated movies should consistently strive for. It hit’s home runs in animation, story and talent performance.

Toy Story’s animation did a great job bringing toys to life, especially the small details that really make it hit home. While watching the movie for this post I noticed that the army men had small plastic circles on their backs, a result of the molding process evident on the real life version. This level of attention to detail lends itself to the stylized realism that Pixar employed in this and other releases.

Like many of the classic animated movies, and much of AFI’s Top 100 in general, a great story keeps the movie fresh without feeling dated. I watched the movie with my children who enjoyed it (see the video below) even though it was made 7 – 10 years before their birth. The same can’t be said about some of my favorite childhood animated shows. I’m sure they’d look at Thundarr the Barbarian much they same way I look at Howdy Doody from my parent’s childhood (thinly veiled amusement .. “you used to watch that?!”).

Toy Story avoids this issue by having a great childhood premise that everyone can relate to, regardless of age: what if toys were alive. Everyone has used this as the premise of countless hours of childhood playtime, Pixar brought it to life. Beyond a great premise, the script has the right mix of child & adult humor to appeal to the whole family. As much as I like the Shrek movies, there’s some jokes that I’m glad my girls didn’t get when they were toddlers.

Finally, the talent performances were world class. Tom Hanks is totally believable as Woody, the well intentioned cowboy. Tim Allen as the ego centric Buzz Lightyear was genius, he was able to perfect a similar character in Galaxy Quest a few years later. The rest of the cast was equally superb and delivered great performances that brought familiar toys to life.

Toy Story is a great movie that absolutely deserves it’s place on the all time greatest movies list, if not positioned a little higher than #99. It’s timeless animation, story, and performances still capture the imaginations of children and adults. I have no doubt that I’ll some day watch it with my grandchildren (hopefully that day is a LONG way off).

Here’s what my kids thought of the movie.

Here’s the opening 10 minutes on YouTube.