The mislocated accent didn’t bother me as much as the fact that the Pat Buttram accent (quintessential Southern) personified the half-wit hick who was going to look like an idiot by the end of the movie. It’s just another crappy bit of shorthand, like Larry the Cable Guy.
I like the movie and love that they got Mario Andretti, Michael Schumacher, Richard Petty and Junior to do voices. But it drags in the middle with too much of “arrogant young hot shot learns about life in the sticks”.
I have tried to watch it 3 times and fell asleep each time.
Cars misfired on so many levels. For me the strongest disconnect was between an eery, Ballardian, post-apocalyptic world where all human life had obviously been wiped out, and the bizarre idea that a post-human machine civilization would not only be apparently unaware of the devastating tragedy of their human creators, but would include such things as the voice of Larry the Cable Guy. Classic surrealism, but stupider.
That gave me a good laugh. A Ballardian Cars would have been great. Complete with giant billboards with flashing lights that subliminally transmit messages encouraging the purchase of consumer goods like cigarettes and infrared barbecue spits.
Mr. Towers, I enjoyed that post. And Least Original, I also enjoyed the South Park Rob Schneiderlink?
At first, I was completely turned off by this film. It seemed like such an obvious merchandising scheme (“OOh, lots of kids like to play with cars! Let’s make a movie about CARS! Think of all them toys we could sell and money we could make!”), and then when I saw it, I found it all pretty Meh.
Then, when my obsessed-with-vehicles-since-10mos-then-20-month-old son had to stay home with the flu while I was still recovering from back surgery (and thus unable to chase after him), I saw it was on Encore. I turned it on for him while he lay on my reclining body on the couch. After the opening scene, where everything is black and Lightning says, “Speed. I am speed,” followed by the blur of racing cars before going back to black for continued narration, my son immediately signed and said, “More! More! More!” (Heh heh, easy son, there’s 115min “more” coming.) Ever since, he has been captivated by this film.
I have seen in scores of times since, mostly in parts (rarely does he watch entire length movies), and I have come to appreciate it more as time has passed. The artwork, the humor, the storyline…it’s all grown on me.
Son 1.0 is now 3 1/2 years old and stil loves this film, and while I have showed him others, this remains his favorite. I actually prefer it as it’s one of the few kid’s films out there without a dark scene; he’s a sensitive, nightmare-prone sort, and he’s still a bit young to understand the scarier scenes. He likes Finding Nemo, for example, but the mother fish eaten by the barracuda, the shark chasing Dory and Marlin, and the lantern fish coming after them were too much. Recently I decided to show him the movie including those scenes (I had been skipping those chapters on the DVD the few times he’d seen it in the past; as he was older and had been asking questions about death, I wanted to use this as an opportunity to discuss it), and he had nightmares of a fish chasing him that night.
Cars? No such scary scene. The car crashes aren’t menacing to him, and he knows everyone gets fixed and all better.
Yup, this movie has grown on me. Finding Nemo and Up are more my thing, though.
I would enjoy a Cars 2 that was set in Europe. I don’t dig the whole “slice of Americana” thing. I’d like to see a version with BMWs, Mercs, SAABs, Citroens, Rolls-Royces, etc etc. European cars are intensely more interesting and have more character to them, in my opinion, than American ones.
To me it felt sort of like something I saw on the Simpsons - that bit where Krusty is doing one of his show’s, and it’s a skit that’s about a family with giant ears? The one that totally bombed? I don’t know if you follow my logic, but there was a little too much made of the fact that they were cars.
Yeah, but the sentiment is all wonky. The “Route 66” town got it’s livelihood from the 1920’s-built US Route system, which itself decimated hundreds of railroad communities. That musical moment in the movie was so eye-rollingly hypocritical in its revisionist history as to make the entire movie seem a forced lesson in fake sentiment.
I truly think the theme of Cars should’ve been “Payback’s a bitch.”
ETA: BTW, I thought the town was on the original Route 66 and the issue was it (the town) being bypassed by an Interstate. Am I wrong? It’s been a while since I’ve seen the film.
That is correct.
F1 champion Michael Schumacher (the FERRARI!!! /Tony Schaloob voiced car faints) was tossed in as a sop to the international market.
I really hope all you folks who complained about the movie ripping off Doc Hollywood were doing so ironically…
Yeah I mixed that up. It’s all new to me.
I did not know that. I don’t think honoring the Route 66 town’s economic deprivation necessarily fails to validate the economic deprivation that resulted from the construction of Route 66. It’s not like these people deliberately set out to deprive anyone. They were just trying to make a living like anyone else. So ‘‘payback’’ doesn’t resonate with me here.
Ah, but today’s older adults don’t remember the railroad communities. They do remember stuff like Route 66 before the interstates. Route 66 and car culture are what current Americans remember nostalgically. Everything before then may as well not have existed.
When I first heard of it in development I thought it a genius move from a business perspective. Boys love cars, toy cars, real cars, cartoon cars, anything cars. It was an instant moneymaker.
Still it isn’t my favorite, though I do like it better than A Bug’s Life and Wall-E.
Part of the problem was its predictability. I mean it is easy to see where the film is going after about ten minutes, and there is nothing wrong with that (especially in a kid’s movie). But it didn’t deviate at all from the course; there was nothing remotely original or surprising about the story. Thus there was no suspense and no real drama. I own the film, but when I have to watch it I get bored about a third through, and I am always glad it is finally over when it ends.
The animation is pretty boring too. Part of the problem is that we connect emotionally with faces, and the car faces just aren’t complex enough to develop a deep connection with. Also with other Pixar films I find myself delighted with noticing the little details and hidden ingenuities – not so much with cars.
Another problem is that is came out after The Incredibles, the best Pixar film to date and one of the ten best animated films in history. It was a tough act to follow.
Still there are positives. It keeps the kids interested. Bonnie Hunt’s voice work is good. Some details in the animation are superb, especially smoke, dust and flame. And as mentioned above the theme of the lost town is an important part of recent American history. Here in Texas there used to be dozens and dozens of quaint, cozy, community-oriented, almost storybook small towns scattered around the state. Now most of them are empty, rickety, ghost towns because they didn’t end up next to an interstate highway. Some are making their way back up now, but it is a tough fight. It is an important story to be told.
Love Cars. Love love love it. It’s not my favorite (that would be Monsters, Inc., I think), but it’s up there. Certainly above Wall-E or Ratatouille.
It’s a car movie, made for car people. And clearly, not a ton of people are car people. But for those who are, it’s perfect. I grew up watching open wheel racing (CART, not NASCAR), and the racing scenes are letter perfect with lots of touches that, did you not know racing, you’d never miss. But for those who do know racing, they’re essential. Couple that with the nostalgia and loss themes and Paul Newman, and bingo bango - awesome.
Love Cars.
Seriously? I must have missed the big race at tbe beginning of Doc Hollywood, wehre he has to commit to a tiebreaker race between 2 other doctors. I also missed the part of Cars where Lightning has to try to eat a pheasant filled with buckshot, or any of about 2 million other scenes that are different between the movie. I think the only “scene” that might be similar is the crashing through the caution cones, and even that was just a small part of a much larger scene, involving the flinging of an old Model T through the air…
No, it is not a car movie, made for car people. It is a “classic American car” movie made for “classic American car” people. I’m a car person; I just prefer European and Japanese cars. There weren’t any of those in the movie, except for the Porsche (which was a lame model anyway) and one Ferrari at the end. I also love classic American 4x4s (Scout, Bronco, Blazer, Jeep) - didn’t see any of those in the movie. I love the “faces” of different cars that are created by their grilles and headlights - they have a lot of personality. Too bad the movie missed the opportunity to work with that, instead giving every car the same goddamn silly-looking ugly face and cartoon eyes.
It isn’t really a shot for shot remake, but is a lot more than a movie with a similar theme:
An opening montage showing what a hot shot the lead is followed by a scene showing how dissatisfied he is and setting up a need to get cross country in a hurry. Then after a scenic drive including comedic hazards, the lead messes up a small town and pisses off a judge without it really being his fault. Then he is sentenced to community service in the town where he is mentored by someone from an earlier generation(who takes an instant dislike to him to begin with) and falls in love with the most sophisticated person in the town(who also takes an initial dislike to him). He comes to love the town and the townfolk come to love him. He is sent on his way to California and glory but needs the help of the curmudgeonly older mentor to get what he came for. In the end he realizes that he belongs in that small town after all.
I have a 2 year old and have watched this movie way more than I would have chosen to. It is not that bad, but besides the fact that it follows a predictable story line and the world makes no logical sense (there are car babies at the big race and the cars can run out of gas and the only thing that stops are their wheels, etc.) neither of which are really big issues for in a movie for kids, there is one big thing I dislike about this movie. I don't like the current trend of stunt casting voices in these movies. Pixar has been better than many, but of the Pixar movies this one is the worst. In a cartoon about cars, I would prefer not to recognize the voices and have the face interfere with what I am seeing. If the voice actor can not fully inhabit the character, they should not be a voice actor. I would never claim that Tim Allen was a better actor than Tom Hanks, but he did a better job in Toy Story. It takes me out an animated movie when I can "see" the actor behind the character. In this movie Tony Shaloub and Michael Keaton did a great job, but Owen Wilson, Cheech Maron, and Paul Newman all took me out of the movie. Even Larry the Cable Guy was doing ok until he had to throw in his "git-r-done" at the race track. Before that I was buying him as a character. After that, I all saw was the stand up comedian.
Jonathan