Tag Archives: animation

The MCC 2025 Oscar-Nominated Short Film Revue

February 28, 2025 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
2-D animated woman asleep on a floor mat in light shadows with sunlight pouring in through a narrow rectangular window. Next to her on a table are components of an elderly relative's daily medicinal regimen.

Don’t sleep your life away! There’re always cool new things to see!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: my annual Oscar Quest continues! I’m still trying to catch all the Academy Award nominees I can before the big ceremony regardless of whether I think I’ll like them or not, whether their politics and beliefs agree with mine or not, whether they’re good or bad for me, and whether or not my friends and family will care in the least bit.

Each year since 2009 (except for 2021’s pandemic lockdown marathon) I’ve ventured out to the few Indianapolis theaters carrying the big-screen releases of the Academy Award nominees for Best Live-Action Short Film and Best Animated Short Film. Results vary each time and aren’t always for all audiences, but I appreciate the opportunities to sample such works and see what the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences deemed worthy of celebrating, whether I agree with their collective opinions or not. My wife and adult son usually accompany me on the journey and we make a family outing of it, even though Oscar Quest is not their problem. Since 2019 I’ve also given myself extra credit for catching as many nominees for Best Documentary Short Film as possible, depending on their availability online, for the most complete shorts experience possible.

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My 2024 at the Movies, Part 2 of 2: The Top 10

January 11, 2025 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Tiny blond witch holds large ugly witch's hat.

Everyone don your sorting hats!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

It’s listing time again! In today’s entertainment consumption sphere, all experiences must be pitted against each other and assigned numeric values that are ultimately arbitrary to anyone except the writer themselves. It’s just this fun thing some of us love doing even though the rules are made up and the points don’t matter. I saw 29 films in theaters in 2024 that were actually released in 2024. Seven were screenings at the 33nd annual Heartland Film Festival, some of whose makers are still seeking an American distributor. In young-adulthood I used to scoff at critics who’d fill their year-end Top 10s with films they saw at festivals that none of their readers would be able to watch for another few months, if ever. Now that I’ve participated in a festival these past two years, those seven totally count and I’m not cheating by including them. This is, like, just different.

Here’s the annual rundown of what I didn’t miss in theaters in 2024. Links to past excessively wordy reviews and sometimes bizarrely construed thoughts are provided for historical reference…

On with the better end of the countdown!

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Yes, There’s a Scene During the “Moana 2” End Credits

December 15, 2024 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Moana holding an oar, Maui holding his giant hook, both standing on a boat and looking upward.

They’re back! And they brought their favorite tools!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: in Walt Disney Pictures’ century-long quest to devote at least one major animated feature to every human community or geographic region ever, they turned their attention to the Pacific Islands for Moana, a rousing high-seas mythical adventure that featured the lyrical stylings of Lin-Manuel Miranda during his post-Broadway movie-musical phase and a strong duo at its core — Auli’i Cravalho as the titular heroine whose connection to her environment brought an end to her home island’s cursed isolation; and Dwayne Johnson (on break from like twelve other acting jobs) as the vain demigod Maui who helped save the day with his magic tattoos, animal shapeshifting, and enchanted Saw-hook.

Moana and Maui are back with Moana 2, which was conceived as a Disney+ series before execs remembered movies can make way more money than TV, especially if the movie doesn’t suck. The reworking of that proposed material may explain why we have three credited directors and only two writers (the latter of which include Jared Bush, who was one of eight on the first one), but it works well enough for anyone who simply wants more Moana and Maui and isn’t finicky about the rest. The tremendously upgraded budget helps, one befitting a Disney theatrical release rather than simply stapling together whatever rough animatics were already in the can. It isn’t perfect and the first one’s better, but it’s better than the dregs of, say, The Fox and the Hound 2.

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Yes, There’s a Scene After “The Wild Robot” End Credits

October 15, 2024 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
The Wild Robot nuzzling a gosling in its palm.

Concept art for my upcoming fanfic, “Atomic Robo Meets Henery Hawk”.

Today all animated films are guaranteed a release on popular streaming services pretty quickly after completion, whether the studios think they’re worth the effort of a few weeks’ theatrical run first or they’re quitters who send them direct-to-video, which isn’t quite as stigmatizing as it was in the Blockbuster Video era. In happier times my year-end movie-going lists used to be filled with animation, often ranking near or at the top. Nowadays, not so much — trailers and pro reviews aren’t dissuading my middle-ager’s skeptical inertia even when those films do become available for my streaming convenience. I haven’t bothered to add Strange World or Wish to my Disney+ queue, let alone watched them. Whether it’s rampant sequelitis or the innate mediocrity of jukebox musicals or a studio satisfied with selling half-hearted results, don’t hold your breath waiting for my opinions on Kung Fu Panda 4, the Trolls series, or anything containing a Minion after their debut.

Last time I paid full price for a DreamWorks Animated joint, it was in 2019 when the third How to Train Your Dragon proved the weakest of the trilogy. I largely ignored their subsequent, determinedly populist fare till I “had to” watch 2022’s Puss in Boots: The Last Wish as part of my annual Oscar Quest and was astonished at the results. I was therefore a little more receptive when DreamWorks announced their big 2024 release, The Wild Robot, would be directed by Chris Sanders, whose past works include Lilo & Stitch and the first How to Train Your Dragon — two all-ages spectacles he co-directed that I went into with low expectations only for my heart to grow three sizes too big by the end. With The Wild Robot, Sanders has now gone three-for-three with said enlarged heart.

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Yes, There Are Scenes During and After the “Transformers One” End Credits

October 14, 2024 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Young Optimus Prime and Megatron sitting on a couch and smiling.

Just hanging out after work, two buddies who have each other’s backs and will never, ever, ever lead separate sides in a planetary civil war. Friendship!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

Seeing every Transformers film in theaters, no matter how much we’ve come to dread them, is among our few enduring father/son traditions. He grew up as they grew bigger and dumber. Nevertheless, the boy and I would suffer each canned serving of Cinema In Name Only and always spend the car ride home dissecting them together…

After Michael Bay ruined toy robots for several generations of kids to come, damage control efforts have varied. Some gave it a nice try; some made things worse. We nearly excused ourselves from seeing Transformers One because the first trailer’s so-so kiddie-comedy vibe felt aimed at complete newbies with no Transformers experience because their parents shielded them from such harmful matter. Then came the showier, more dramatic second trailer, along with the surprisingly positive buzz from early screenings. Those factors convinced us to give the Robots in Disguise yet another chance. To our shock, T1 may in fact be one of the best Transformers feature films of all time, if partly by forfeit.

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Yes, There’s a Scene After the “Inside Out 2” End Credits

June 23, 2024 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , 3 Comments
Joy stands excitedly at the control panel with Anxiety, who looks sheepish and very orange. The room is all purple with rows of yellow light bulbs.

Manic Pixie Dream Joy welcomes Frazzled Rock!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: Pixar made an entire movie about feels feeling feels! As someone who responds well to films that probe deeper emotions than “wheeeee”, I named Pete Doctor’s Inside Out my favorite film of 2015 – against the heavyweight competition of Creed, Spotlight, and Fury Road — after its in-depth examination of baseline emotions via cutesy anthropomorphization, as well as its complicated theses about the importance of sadness and the beginning of the end of childhood, wrecked me in the theater twice, back in that bygone era when I’d go see a film in theaters more than once if I thought it was that awesome.

Nine years later, Pixar has the blemished scorecard of any ordinary animation studio. I’ve had such mixed reactions that I only saw one of their last five films in theaters (and regretted giving in to the cash-grab). Nevertheless, I agreeably let them redeem Inside Out‘s stack of goodwill chips and left the house to catch the new Inside Out 2 while my inner voices of Skepticism and Hope squabbled with each other like Siskel and Ebert. Each of them scored points off the other, leaving me wrecked and nitpicky.

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“Robot Dreams”: You’ve Got a Friend in Me (for Now)

March 7, 2024 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
A cartoon dog and a robot on a skyscraper's observation deck playing around on coin-op binoculars. Other cartoon animal tourists are scattered around the deck, including a yak.

If you love pointing at ’80s stuff or iconic NYC places, have we got a film for you!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: Oscar Quest ’24 continues! We do our best to see how many freshly nominated works we can catch before ABC’s big, indulgent Academy Awards ceremony ends the viewing season.

Each year there’s at least one nominee for Best Animated Feature that’s completely unknown to mainstream audiences because they don’t come with a massive corporate brand stamped on the front. This year is no exception: Pablo Berger’s li’l Spanish dramedy Robot Dreams kept me waiting for any kind of release, whether streaming or in theaters. My patience finally paid off: Indianapolis’ own Kan-Kan Cinema was among the few theaters holding exclusive, one-night-only screenings the Wednesday before the Oscars. I showed up alongside three or four dozen other folks at various stages of their own Oscar Quests. Oscar Quest is often such a solitary activity for me that it was nice not to be alone for a little while.

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Disney World! Part 7: Our 50th Anniversary Gold Statue Scorecard

February 5, 2024 By in Travel Tags: , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Gold statues of kid mariachi hero and happy ghost dog, in the middle of a garden. A lagoon is in the background.

It’s Miguel and Dante from Pixar’s Coco! And they’re golden!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

Each year Anne and I take one (1) road trip to a different part of the United States and see attractions, wonders, and events we didn’t have back home. One thing we rarely do is fly. We’d much rather drive than be flown unless we absolutely have to…or are given some pretty sweet incentives to do so. Fast-forward to December 2022 and a most unexpected opportunity: The Powers That Be at Anne’s rather large place of employment recognized her and several other employees nationwide for outstanding achievements in the field of excellence. Their grand prize was a Disney World vacation! We could at last announce to friends and family, “THE GOLDENS ARE GOING TO DISNEY WORLD!”

For Anne it was officially, legally a business trip. Much of the time, she’d have to work. Not ME, baby…

As glimpsed in previous chapters, in 2023 Disney World celebrated its fifty years in business, one year younger than me. Among the myriad commemorations was the “Disney Fab 50 Character Collection”, dedicated September 15, 2021. 36 gilded statues starring 50 characters from the biggest brands in the Disney IP portfolio were scattered throughout all four parks. The “Disney Fab 50 Quest” encouraged fans to see how many familiar gold faces they could spot throughout their vacation(s). Any superfan who splurged on a Disney MagicBand+, an electronic bracelet designed to unlock special features throughout the Disney World lands, could wave it at each statue for interactive responses.

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“The Boy and the Heron”: No Sanctuary for Old Birds

January 6, 2024 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Anime characters march down a path through a grassy yard. One young woman wearing a kimono and carrying a bow leads six shorter, elderly women all carrying brooms and itching to swat someone.

Miyazaki hive represent!

The Final Film from Visionary Animator Hayao Myazaki is a phrase that’s been pushed before in marketing, but maybe this time Studio Ghibli totally means it for sure, no take-backs, not a hoax, The Boy and the Heron is absolutely the animation master’s swan song from his beloved medium and then they’re unplugging all his screens and no longer accepting his notes on their future productions, which will merely have to do the best they can without his sage guidance and relentless perfectionism. Hopefully Ghibli’s next phase goes far better than that time Disney ushered in a new artistic era for themselves and the result was Chicken Little.

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Dragon Con 2023 Photos #9: Cosplay Parade Animation and Gaming

September 10, 2023 By in Conventions & Events Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , 6 Comments
refer to caption

A Vault Dweller from Fallout 76 and an Assultron from Fallout 4.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

In 2019 my wife Anne and I attended our very first Dragon Con in Atlanta, Georgia. As one of the longest-running science fiction conventions in America, Dragon Con had received rave reviews from our internet friends over the past two decades, some of whom recommended it to us more than once and, according to my notes, would never shut up about it. We had so much of a blast that we returned in 2021. Third time was the charm this Labor Day weekend as we repeated the eight-hour drive from Indianapolis to that amazing colossal southern spectacle…

Hey-HEY! It’s our fifth gallery from D*C’s annual Saturday morning cosplay parade, always one of our favorite events. The starter exhortations in Part 5 still apply here: if you recognize any characters we didn’t, by all means please let us know! We like welcoming new shows, increasing our awareness, correcting errors, and bridging the gaps in our aging memories where those character names used to be. Between us we took over 600 photos and couldn’t possibly have known everyone. Related note: if you or someone you know was in the parade and you’re hoping for shots of them, pretty-please let us know! We’re taking requests! We’ll be happy to search our files and post ’em if we got ’em. You might come away disappointed, or you might not!

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