The Critic Gets Brave

I’m a Pixar fangirl. I’ve seen every movie they’ve done except for two (Toy Story 3 and Cars 2, because I know you’re wondering). I stopped doubting them after Finding Nemo, which sounded so utterly ridiculous in its tagline that I didn’t believe for a second it would actually be good. Instead, it was an amazing, funny, warm-hearted movie that put me firmly in the “Pixar can do no wrong” camp.

So I might be just a little bit biased toward Brave, which is, as has been much touted, the first Pixar movie to feature a female protagonist.

Merida is a princess who prefers riding horses and shooting arrows to living the rigid, regimented life her mother tries to force on her. Their battle of wills comes to a head when Merida’s mother, by tradition, brings the clans together so the firstborn sons may compete for Merida’s hand in marriage.

Furious, Merida flouts traditions and runs off, looking for a spell that will change her fate. What she gets is a curse that will bring her entire land to ruin if she can’t find a way to break it.

This movie isn’t quite what you’d expect from a story involving a Disney princess. There’s no romantic subplot. Both Merida’s parents are alive. This story is about a mother and a daughter struggling to understand one another, which is amazing, because seriously, show me the last Disney movie that did that.

She and her mother, Elinor, are both sympathetic, which is difficult to do. Merida’s not opposed to marriage; she’s just not ready and she doesn’t want to be handed off to someone she doesn’t know just because they happened to win a contest. Elinor, meanwhile, is trying to ensure that her daughter is ready to take her place as a ruler someday, and that the traditions are part of keeping the peace between their warring clans.

There’s a great scene where Elinor is talking to her husband about Merida and Merida is talking to her horse about her mother. It cuts back and forth as each explains her point of view to the stand-in, but ends with the inevitable “she’ll never understand.” And that’s the most important part of the adventure, perhaps: both Merida and Elinor gaining new respect for each other’s strengths and viewpoints.

On a related note, I totally want to take up archery now.

Merida is also an extremely proactive character, which is a breath of fresh air. The entire story moves because of her actions and decisions. Bringing the clans together for the marriage contest may be her mother’s doing, but Merida’s the one who chooses the contest, Merida’s the one who goes looking for a spell and decides to use it, and Merida’s the one who must put everything back to rights after she screws it up. I liked her and I liked that so much depended on her. It forced her into a role of responsibility, which helped her not only grow, but also understand her mother that much better.

Of course, not all is so serious. Merida’s three little brothers are amazing troublemakers, and even better, they’re completely silent characters. Their antics garnered some of the biggest laughs in the theater. (The bear chase in the castle is hilarious.)

I did have some minor quibbles: for example, the will o’ wisps that showed up throughout the movie might as well have said, “Hi! We’re here to point you on the way to story point #2!” However, they were minor, and the rest of the movie was good enough that I could overlook it.

Brave hasn’t supplanted The Incredibles as my favorite of Pixar’s movies, but it’s a fun, beautiful film that you should see the moment you get a chance. (And you should take your mother and/or daughter when you do.)

The Critic’s Most Anticipated Summer Movies

I don’t know if it says something about me or about the current crop of summer movies that there are only three I feel like I absolutely, positively MUST see in theaters.

There are several more that interest me, but I’ll need to see more from the movies (or from word-of-mouth) before I decide whether to drop some hard-earned cash on them.

Here are the ones that I’m most looking forward to this summer:

Marvel’s The Avengers – May 4
While the X-Men have always been my favorite superhero group, I have very fond memories of the old Sega Genesis game Captain America and the Avengers. (I didn’t care much for Captain America; Vision and Iron Man were my favorite characters to play.)

However, the Avengers have been growing on me in recent years, though more from movies and video games than from comic books. I’ve enjoyed the hell out of Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, and to say I’ve liked the Marvel movies thus far is a bit of an understatement.

Iron Man, Thor, and Captain America were all fantastic and fun, and Iron Man 2 was pretty entertaining (not quite as good as the first one, though). Each one made me more excited for this film, even though I was initially wary when The Avengers was originally announced a few years ago.

Throw Joss Whedon in as writer/director, and you have the makings of an awesome summer movie. I may not be dressed up for this one, but I will be there with bells on opening weekend.

Brave – June 22
I think it’s safe to say that I’m a Pixar fangirl, so I will see just about anything they put out. The only two Pixar movies I haven’t seen are Cars 2 and Toy Story 3, and the latter is not for lack of desire. (The former is really because I had no desire to watch something that looked like it centered entirely around Mater.)

Brave looks fantastic. As always, the animation looks beautiful, and you can tell that the animators put a lot of work and research into the film.

Just read what an actual archer says about Merida’s form in the extended look the studio released several weeks ago. (If you haven’t seen that clip, watch it here. So much love.)

This is also the first Pixar movie with a girl as the main character, which is awesome. What’s even better is just how cool Merida is. Even in that short clip, we really get a sense of the character (which is something Pixar has always done well).

I absolutely can’t wait to see it.

The Dark Knight Rises – July 20
My introduction to the Batman movie franchise was Batman and Robin, which came out right around the time I was old enough to go see PG-13 movies. Before that, my only exposure to the character had come from reruns of the ’60s series with Adam West.

You can probably understand why I was not impressed.

Now, things have changed. Batman Begins is my favorite superhero movie (it just barely edged out X2: X-Men United), and The Dark Knight was an amazing sequel. Christopher Nolan took a character and a franchise that had practically become a joke and made it awesome again.

Everything I’ve seen from The Dark Knight Rises has been mind-blowing. The poster with Bane. The trailer. Just about every single picture I’ve seen thus far.

The only (ONLY) thing I’m iffy on is Catwoman, and really that’s just because Michelle Pfeiffer did such an excellent job in Batman Returns (my favorite of the pre-Nolan Batman films).

But really, Nolan has done such an excellent job on the other Batman films (and even on his non-Batman films, come to that) that I have no worries about whether The Dark Knight Rises will live up to its hype.

What movies are you looking forward to this summer?