Movie Review - Toy Story 3

The summer movie season, up until now, has been a complete and utter disappointment. Movies that were supposed to bring in big bucks at the box office have failed to do so, and the reason isn't the economy, it's that Hollywood has put out a lot of garbage. However, every summer has at least one guaranteed bright spot in the latest offering from Pixar. In the past two years Pixar has released 2 movies that currently reside in my top 10 movies of all time (a list which is always subject to change.) Part of the reason that I love these two movies ("Up" and "Wall-E") was due to how fresh they felt. So, I was hesitant when I heard that Pixar was heading back to the well and making "Toy Story 3." Don't get me wrong, I love the first two movies, but they don't hold a candle to their most recent offerings.

For me, "Toy Story 3" is really two separate films. The first 80 minutes and then the last 10. The first part of "Toy Story 3" truly felt like we were returning to a world we were familiar with and even covered a similar journey to what we had in the second movie, but this time everyone was learning the lesson that Woody had already learned about being there for Andy. Since we're not learning anything knew there, we only have the journey to look at. Fortunately, they do a terrific job of this. The new additions of Big Baby, Ken and Lotso fit in well with our old favorites. The jokes are sharp, the action crisp and the joy plentiful. However, by the end, when the toys are getting back into the box for the attic, I was starting to feel empty. I went on a journey with these characters but I didn't go anywhere new. They would just be stored in the attic where Pixar can pull them out and dust them off when they wanted to get a large haul at the box office. Then the last 10 minutes happened and changed everything.

When I was younger I played with my toys, exactly like Andy played with his. I used my imagination and came up with long, complicated stories that played out from the sanctuary of my bedroom with my toys as the starring characters. So saying that I can sympathize with Andy when it comes to saying goodbye to those friends is an understatement. Add this feeling to the journey I had already taken with the Toy Story characters and the feeling displayed by the toys of just wanting to be played with having been established throughout the movie and the entire end sequence had me balling in my chair and on the way out of the theater.

This movie proved beyond a doubt that you can always count on Pixar to give you something magical at the theater. The movie gets 4 and 1/2 out of 5 stars.