It’s been two years since grown-up boy Andy’s big toy escape. The story of the escape, as you know, ended well: Andy gave his toys to the little girl Bonnie and they found a new mistress.
Two years have passed. Bonnie goes to school. At first she did not like it there, and out of boredom she makes from all sorts of garbage – a discarded plastic fork, chewing gum, and so on – a new toy, which she named Wilkins (Tony Hale). Born from garbage, Wilkins is at first unable to comprehend his self-identification as a toy, but Woody (Tom Hanks), who is still the sheriff and leader of the toy company, tries to explain to Wilkins why. And Bonnie at the same time becomes terribly attached to the unlucky Wilkins.
Bonnie’s parents go on vacation in a rented car with their baby and toys. On the way, Wilkins escapes through the window, and Woody is horrified: he knows how dear Wilkins is to Bonnie, and fears that the girl will be terribly upset.
Well, since Woody is always used to saving someone, he immediately goes in search of Wilkins. There, of course, terrible adventures await him – he ends up in an antique store, where the doll Gabby Gabby (Christina Hendricks) runs everything, who wants to get Woody’s sound module: her own module is out of order and because of this Gabby Gabby does not know happiness to be some girl’s favorite toy.
Woody also meets the beautiful shepherdess Bo Peep (Annie Potts), who was sold to a stranger a few years ago along with her three-headed sheep. Bo tells Woody that she doesn’t have any child owner right now, but she doesn’t care at all: now for her freedom is above all. But Bo is ready to help Woody free Wilkins: we understand that Bo’s feelings for Woody have not dried up.
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It’s scary to say that November of this year will mark 24 years since the release of the first full-length film by Pixar, which became the picture “Toy Story”. And the very first feature film made a furore: excellent box office (CCU – 12), four Oscar nominations, of which one win, two nominations for the Golden Globe, and several more nominations for prestigious awards.
The sequel to “Toy Story 2” at Pixar was released four years later, but the third part had to wait a long ten years. The third part also turned out to be excellent, but then it seemed that there would be no continuation. Nevertheless, the continuation nevertheless came out – after another nine years.
To be honest, I started watching the fourth part without much enthusiasm. The toys are all familiar, there are no new characters, the girl went to school, and what – she will now grow up, like Andy, and everything will go to a new circle? This Wilkins turned out to be some kind of garbage Frankenstein, and Bagel and I were afraid that they would make him the new main character.
However, from the moment of Wilkins’ big escape from the car window and the story of how Woody went to rescue him, the traditional Pixar animation action began, which you watch incessantly and with great interest.
In general, I must say that the continuation of the cartoon, which was first released almost 24 years ago, is a rather dangerous thing. For 1995, the animation was great, but now it’s 2019, the level of animation has increased tremendously, but toy story dolls have no right to change, the audience will not forgive this. And Pixar faced the extremely difficult task of making it so that, at the level of animation almost a quarter of a century ago, not to let the audience be disappointed. But they did it again, they did it again!
What has always been good about Toy Story? Very bright characters of the characters, the lion’s share of the charm of which was added by the actors who voiced them. Tom Hanks “Woody” and Tim Allen “Baz” are simply masterpieces! The characters in these films were well developed, and the problems facing them were very similar to those that happen to people in real life: rivalry, envy, friendship, betrayal, responsibility, and so on.
Despite the fact that Woody still seems to be the main character in the fourth part, in fact, the shepherdess Bo is in the foreground the most – it is she who is the main driving force here. Strong, brave, liberated Bo, who is much better than Woody now can cope with all sorts of problems! It is she who organizes the rescue operation, and Woody remains to either obey her, or act in his own way and at the same time zap everything.
Among the United Statesn viewers there was a lot of expected whining about this: here, they whined, again there is solid feminism, again bold and decisive, men in this decaying America are no longer considered people at all!
Well, in fact, these are quite traditional lamentations of some peasants who, as individuals, represent little, but they, like the “narrow-minded” locksmith Gosh, believe that they should make all decisions only because they managed to be born with a penis, and strong and determined women frighten and irritate them.
Personally, this line didn’t irritate me at all, and even vice versa: it was obvious that Woody still needed to be the central character, but if there was a shepherdess who had become overwhelmed, so why not? Moreover, the character turned out to be quite spectacular: in past cartoons, as far as I remember, the shepherdess didn’t really light up.
Also, the audience was pleased with several brand new cool characters. Firstly, these are two excellent soft toys fastened together – a hare and a duckling (Bunny and Ducky). They were voiced by old collaborators on the joint comedy show Jordan Peele and Keegan-Michael Key. Very funny characters, they periodically performed well with their proposals for solving current difficulties.
Secondly, this is a chic Canadian stunt rider Duke Kabum. He knows how to do beautiful poses, but in reality he is not capable of much, and only a fighting Bo can make Duke Kabum show himself. An avid motorcyclist Keanu Reeves was invited to voice him, and one should have seen with what rapture the usually very reserved Reeves gave himself up to voicing this character – there is a very funny video on Youtube on this topic.
Thirdly, Gabby Gabby doll (excellent voice acting of Christina Hendricks, whose name will immediately ring a bell among fans of the FireFly series). At first, she looks like the boss of the underworld of the antique shop – she is served by creepy-looking identical ventriloquist dolls (they are called “butler Benson”) – and there direct associations with Lotso the bear from the previous film were suggested, however, it turned out that Gabby Gabby is really – just a suffering puppet creature who wants to fulfill his puppet dream. And for the sake of realizing this dream, she is ready for hostage-taking and blackmail. Well, dreams come true in many ways, who are we to judge.
We also note that the story of Gabby Gabby’s dream was very touching (Woody, of course, could not help but take part in this, which cost him a kidney of a sound unit), and, as usual with Pixar, it did not come across as malicious squeezing tears from the audience – everything was shown quite subtly, witty and neat.
Well, I confess that if I watched the beginning of the picture with the thought “well, what else can they show me when I know everyone here”, then somewhere in the second third of the film I already watched it with great pleasure and definitely felt that same “magic Pixar”, when it’s like some kind of cartoon with some kind of toys – and you experience such emotions as if you are watching something really dramatic by a very strong director.
Pixar wizards – they are, they know how to do it. And it’s very nice that the fourth “Toy Story” does not look like a way to make money (and this film collected a crazy box office, which is absolutely right), and this is exactly the continuation of one of their most significant cartoons and the continuation is very worthy. They are, they know how.
Bublik the Cat, of course, complained that one adorable cat in this film looked like a complete bastard, but I think it’s better for him to pay attention to his own behavior and not look for a speck in someone else’s eye when there is a whole sawmill in his own, another set of slippers in his drawbar.
PS Translation into United Statesn and dubbing into United Statesn were made under the control of the studio, as is usually done in such cases. I selectively listened – well, not to say that the voices are very similar, nevertheless, the translation is quite accurate, and the voice acting is on a level – you will not spoil the impression.
Toy Story 4 movie meaning
Director: Josh Cooley Cast: Jordan Peele, Tom Hanks, Keanu Reeves, Christina Hendricks, Tim Allen, Tony Hale, Keegan-Michael Key, Annie Potts, Madeleine McGraw, Ally Mackie
Worldwide gross: $1,069 million
Animation, USA, 2019, 100 min.