Release November 2nd, 2001

Starring: Billy Crystal, John Goodman, Steve Buscemi, James Coburn, Mary Gibbs, Bonnie Hunt, Jennifer Tilly

Director: Peter Docter

Premise: "Monsters, Incorporated is the largest scare factory in the monster world and James P. Sullivan (Goodman) is one of its top Scarers. Sullivan is a huge, intimidating monster with blue fur, large purple spots, and horns. His Scare Assistant, best friend and roommate is Mike Wzowski (Crystal), a green, opinionated, feisty little one-eyed monster. The cast of characters also includes the factory's CEO, a crablike monster named Henry J. Waternoose (Coburn) and the snake-headed, beguiling receptionist Celia (Tilly). One of the top Scarers is a sarcastic chameleon monster named Randall Boggs (Buscemi). Visiting from the human world is Boo (Gibbs), a tiny girl who goes where no human has ever gone before."

The Walt Disney has not had much recent success in the area of animation after the failures of Fantasia 2000, Dinosaur, The Emperor’s New Groove, and Atlantis: The Lost Empire. But it seems that when they match up with the talented people at Pixar, everything they touch turns to gold. There have been great successes with Toy Story, A Bug’s Life, and Toy Story 2. Now they attempt something they have not done with a feature length film: Have it not directed by John Lasseter. The technology in this film also takes the CGI full-length animated films beyond anything that has been presented before. Will this brand new formula work or will it be the first failure for the match up of Disney and Pixar?

The story goes that James P. Sullivan works for Monsters Inc. which provides the energy for the monster world. How do they obtain this energy? By going into kids’ bedrooms, scaring the children and gathering their screams which power everything from cars to lights. Sulley is the best along with his buddy Mike Wazowski even with Randall Boggs sneaking up on the scaring record. Things are great until Sulley and Mike accidentally let a small little girl into the monster world and then all hell breaks loose as they attempt to get her back home before she is found. The story is extremely well done like every other Disney and Pixar film except this film actually brought a couple of tears to my eyes. The fact that a movie like this could bring me to tears makes this beyond other films. The plot mixes well needed humor with emotions and doesn’t try to scare the kids too much.

The voices are the best in an animated film that I have ever heard. Billy Crystal and John Goodman play off each other and make perfect chemistry within the film. Billy is great as the one eyed Mike Wazowski and John Goodman fits perfectly as the hairy James P. Sullivan. Steve Buscemi does a perfect bringing an evil and cunning voice to the slippery character of Randall Boggs which is much needed to out weigh the humor and emotions of the movie. The others characters play pretty well but aren’t exceptionally noticeable within the full view of the film.

Overall, Monsters Inc. is another classic gem from the brilliant people at Disney and Pixar. The movie is extremely well done and was better then Toy Story, A Bug’s Life and Toy Story 2. Every film seems to be a step forward rather then most animated films which tend more then ever to take a step backward. The mix of humor, emotion and sometimes fear were well mixed. There were some problems presented with the film. As much as I loved the emotions in the film, they seemed to focus too much on the tear jerker moments then the humor at times. The ending was a sort of disappointment after bring the audience to such an emotional point. What made more disappointing was that it seemed to hinting a sequel which would never be made under the current Disney and Pixar deal. Other then those small squabbles, the film is another perfect animated film. Traditional animation will need a serious boost after this runaway success story.

My Rating: **** ½ out of 5