Toy Story 2

Directed by John Lasseter
Featuring the voices of Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, Joan Cusack, Kelsey Grammer
USA, 1999
Rated G

A

FUN... AND AS PURE AS IT COMES
Toy Story 2 may be the best sequel I’ve seen since The Empire Strikes Back, which the film mimics in a perilous scene featuring Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) meeting his toy foe, Sarge (R. Lee Ermey). Animated films of recent years have been devoid of imagination; the last great non-Pixar Disney movie I saw was The Hunchback of Notre Dame back in 1996. Last year, A Bug’s Life, Pixar’s first film after the groundbreaking Toy Story, demonstrated director John Lasseter’s utterly breathtaking ability to weave awesome 3D computer animation with exciting adventure. This year, Toy Story 2, Pixar’s best full-length movie yet, reminds us of how much we loved the first of the Toy Story duo and how much we loved our childhood playmates, our toys.

The screenplay delightfully makes the toys seem all-important in this here world: in this sequel, Al, a toy store manager, fiercely covets a Woody (Tom Hanks) doll, a rare item which would earn him a bundle of cash from a Tokyo museum. Woody has just had his fabric arm ripped and is seriously thinking about the day when his owner, Andy, will grow up and abandon him. His throngs of toy friends attempt to comfort him, repeatedly referring to Andy’s written name on Woody’s shoe, which, even in the first movie, has been an emblem of safety ad being wanted. One day, Andy’s mother holds a yard sale and Woody, after saving one of Andy’s forgotten toys, is stolen by Toy Story 2’s core villain, round Al. Being indebted to their friend, Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen), Mr. Potato Head (Don Rickles), and Slinky Dog (Jim Varney) begin a long trek to the toy-napper’s store, Al’s Toy Barn, to save their pal.

At the store, Woody is patched up (by a character who strongly resembles the old man from the Pixar short, Geri’s Game), worshipped by Al for his financial worth, and meets three toys that have been stuffed in a box in Al’s office for ages, waiting for Woody, the prodigal son. Woody learns that he and other Woody toys originated from the heyday of Woody’s Roundup, a successful TV show that spawned a huge fan base of children and a string of merchandise before the dawn of Sputnik, after which children paid more attention to space toys. Jessie (Joan Cusack), the cowgirl; Stinky Pete the Prospector (Kelsey Grammer); and an adoring horse make up the waiting trio. Since Woody has arrived, Al’s Woody’s Roundup set is complete and ready to be accepted by a Japanese museum that will pay big bucks. Woody is torn between returning to an uncertain future with a growing Andy and an eternal wealth of fame and adoration from generations of kids in Tokyo. Jessie convinces him (temporarily) to go to Tokyo with them to be museum pieces by crooning and reminiscing in a heartbreaking flashback that shows her owner Emily’s transition from loving her to loving nail polish to going to college and leaving her on the side of the road in a box marked "Donations" (Lilith Fair empress Sarah McLachlan, of whom, may I interject, I am a relatively big fan, acts as the singing voice).

I am aware that I am sounding nonsensical, but Toy Story 2 is an exciting event for animated films. It isn’t exactly groundbreaking (the first of the two was), but it is immensely entertaining and a film that creates a much welcome culmination of moody childhood nostalgia for adults and thoughts of pending adulthood for kids. And what’s great about Toy Story 2 is that if you aren’t moved by the toy characters’ determination to get back home to Andy, you are still allowed to have a great, fun time. Within every single frame of the movie, there are animation wonders and marvels of filmmaking and entertainment. The inclusion of the Barbie doll in the movie is particularly enjoyable.

Many critics have hypothesized that the two Toy Story movies are metaphors for growing older and the dangers that await people in the world. Such statements seem to take away from the entertainment the two movies so creatively provide, yet, I do not completely disagree with these conclusions. I suppose they are at the root of what is so darn successful about the Toy Story movies, and even A Bug’s Life: we can identify with the movies’ characters, even though they are objects, and are animated. There is a beautiful connection that is made between the audience and the characters and all three Pixar movies are a perfect synergy of dazzling visuals and stories of simple underdogs off on big adventures of dignity and courage. John Lasseter and everyone else involved with Toy Story 2 seem to do their jobs so effortlessly. It seems as if the sequel to a movie that didn’t need one was the most inevitable thing in the world. This new film does not rely on tricks from its predecessor, but it is not disconnected from it. Toy Story 2 accelerates, increases, and elaborates on the first, great 1995 outing and turns it into perhaps the best film of 1999, and a film that is even more impressive than the first.

By Andrew Chan

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