In 1995, Pixar released Toy Story, the first full length computer animated movie. In the eleven years since then, Pixar has released five other full length computer animated movie and become the leader in computer animation. Other movie studios have followed in Pixar’s footsteps, none of them quite reaching the same level of greatness. I’ve been looking forward to seeing Cars, Pixar’s newest movie, for several months now. I had really high expectations before seeing this movie and I wasn’t disappointed.

Lightning McQueen was on his way to becoming the first rookie race car to win the Piston Cup. Lightning had to get to California for a race with Chick Hicks and The King to determine who would win the Piston Cup. Something went wrong during the drive and Lightning got separated from Mack, his car hauler, and ended up in Radiator Springs, a small town along Route 66. The town had been bypassed by the interstate, so not many tourists stopped by anymore. Lightning managed to tear up the road and was taken into court. The judge, Doc Hudson, was ready to let Lightning go because he didn’t want a race car around town when Sally Carrera, the town lawyer, arrived and insisted that Lightning be made to fix the road. Lightning wasn’t happy about being stuck in what he considered the middle of no where. The town and the residents started to grow on Lightning as the race day approached.

Pixar has excelled at creating worlds with unique characters in their movies. The two Toy Story movies had toys that came to life when children left the room. A Bug's Life was about an ant colony trying to deal with grasshoppers. Monsters, Inc. was about the monsters that hide in children’s closets. Finding Nemo was set in the ocean and had a clown fish searching for his missing son. The Incredibles was the only Pixar movie that had humans as main characters, but they weren’t exactly normal. The main characters were a family of superheroes. For Cars, a world that was somewhat similar to the real world yet also very unique was created. The world was populated with cars instead of people. The cars were alive and had jobs like being a judge, lawyer, race car driver, or small business owner. Everything in the world revolved around cars in some way. The rooms at the hotel were like garages and the restaurant served gas and oil. For fun, Mater took Lightning tractor tipping and the tractors even stampeded like cows. Even the insects were tiny flying Volkswagen Beetle cars. Everything in the movie worked and made things seem more believable.

I had known that Cars was going to have cars as characters since I first saw a teaser trailer when I went to see The Incredibles. It wasn’t until a few months that I found out that racing was going to be a big part of the movie. I don’t watch any kind of racing and fail to see why NASCAR is so popular. I just don’t get the appeal of watching cars drive around in circles for hours. I was a little concerned about how much I would like Cars after I found out about the racing element. I shouldn’t have worried. I loved the movie even though I don’t like racing. I think other people who aren’t racing fans can enjoy the movie too. I didn’t have any trouble following what was going on with the racing part. There was enough explanation so that people that don’t know much about racing shouldn’t have trouble following what was going on. The scenes that featured the races added some action to the movie and were faster paced than other parts of the movie. The pace did slow down some once Lightning was in Radiator Springs without it getting boring for me. This was long for an animated movie, just over two hours, so it might be too long for younger children. The children that were in the theater when I saw it all seemed to stay interested.

Cars started off with a race that would be important in determining the Piston Cup winner. The whole racing element did seem to be a lot like NASCAR, at least based on what I know about it. The first several minutes covered the race and helped to show the type of character Lightning was. The final race in California was very important to Lightning and he talked about it more than once. There were really only two sequences that featured big races, so it wasn’t like the entire movie was just racing, though there were some scenes in Radiator Springs that featured some racing as well. The main point of the movie was showing the changes that Lightning went through once he arrived in Radiator Springs. He’d always been in such a hurry everywhere, and he started to see the benefit to taking things slower. Other movies have told the same sort of story. This movie does share similarities with Doc Hollywood with that part of the plot, and even with the part about someone on the way to the big city causing damage in a small town and being made to stay and fix things. That didn’t make this movie any less entertaining for me. The story was told in a new way that was very enjoyable even though a few aspects of it were predictable.

Cars had a lot of humor and made me laugh throughout the movie. There were some jokes put in that were aimed more at adults, like related to just exactly what type of product Lightning’s sponsor made, that went over the heads of the kids. There was really only a couple of times that had any kind of gross humor was used. That didn’t bother me since it wasn’t the main form of humor for the movie like has happened in some other animated movies. I thought the movie was very funny. There were a few other little jokes that children may not get, like how Sarge the army jeep would call Filmore the VW bus a hippy. There were a few slightly suggestive jokes in the movie, but I don’t think parents would have to worry about them. One swear word was used two different times, which might concern some parents. The movie was rated G, so it really is fine for children. I think the only possible problem would be the length for some children. People who have seen all of the previous movies from Pixar may spot a few cute references to things from those movies. Once the movie is over, there were some really cute scenes playing during the credits. There was also a short scene after the credits were all done. It is definitely worth staying to see those extra scenes.

The animation in Cars was stunningly beautiful, which I expected before seeing the movie because of what Pixar was able to accomplish in their previous animated movies. Many of the scenes featured the natural landscape around Radiator Springs. The landscapes looked so realistic and beautiful. The main part of the movie took place in a desert area and some of the characters ended up driving on dirt roads which stirred up a lot of dust that looked incredibly realistic. A few of the scenes included water hitting a car or a waterfall and a lake that looked absolutely amazing. I was amazed at how wonderful the animation in the movie looked right from the first minutes of the movie. The cars had eyes where the windshields should be and mouths in place of the grills and they still managed to look realistic. Lights reflected off the paint and there were shadows when the cars were moving. The scenes during the races featured close ups of the wheels spinning. The actual surface of the track looked very real to me.

When Lightning and Mack started the trip to California, it was at night and they were traveling on a busy interstate. There were shots in that part that looked so realistic with all the tail lights and even the lights along the sides of the big trucks. Even scenes from the interstate during the day looked very realistic except for all the vehicles having eyes. After Lightning had been driving in the dust, he looked a bit dull because of the fine layer of dust covering him. Pixar has raised the bar even higher for future computer animated movies and I don’t see other studios getting close to this level of quality anytime soon. I have enjoyed other computer animated movies, but the other studios don’t seem to give the same attention to little details that Pixar does or put as much care into developing the stories. It has seemed like Dreamworks especially has been more concerned with rushing to get movies released as soon as possible in the last few years which has caused the quality of the movies to suffer.

All of the characters in Cars were vehicles of some kind. Most of them were cars or trucks, but there were also planes in a few scenes. All of the vehicles were alive in the world of the movie and there were no humans. I think the car characters worked very well and ended up being fuller and richer than characters in many of the other movies I have seen this year. I cared about the characters and what was going to happen to them. I could have sat through another two hours of these characters. Characters don’t have to be flat just because they are in an animated movie even when they aren’t a main character. In Pixar’s movies, the voices always seem to perfectly match the characters. It is like Pixar will find who is best for the character, regardless of how famous they are. It has seemed like other studios have cast the voice talent based solely on how famous the actors are.

Lightning McQueen was a young, cocky race car that was obsessed with becoming the first rookie ever to win the Piston Cup. He was very arrogant, claiming that he worked alone which caused him to go through several crew chiefs during the race season. He was very famous and had all kinds of fans without really having any real friends. He was always in a hurry which got into trouble more than once. Lightning started changing his attitudes after spending some time in Radiator Springs. Owen Wilson’s voice was perfect for the character without being irritating or annoying. Mack, his car hauler, was the closest thing to a friend that Lightning had. Mack wasn’t in a lot of the movie, so John Ratzenberger didn’t have that much to do. He has done a voice in all of the Pixar movies. Some of his parts have been fairly small.

Sally Carrera was a pretty little light blue Porsche that owned the motel in Radiator Springs. She was also the lawyer for the town. She had been living in Los Angeles until she got burned out on life in the fast lane. She loved her new home and kept trying to find ways to get the town back on the map so there would be visitors again. She wasn’t impressed with Lightning’s attitude when he first arrived. In addition to doing Sally’s voice, Bonnie Hunt also contributed some to the screenplay. Doc Hudson was an older car that served as the judge in town. He also owned a repair shop in town. Doc didn’t want Lightning around the town and only had him fixing the road because Sally changed his mind. Doc had a secret that he’d kept from the town. I liked the voice that Paul Newman did for the character.

Mater was the rusty tow truck for the town. His business looked like it was falling apart, sort of like he did. He had to pull Lightning out of a few situations. Mater wasn’t the smartest car around and his idea of fun was tractor tipping. He decided very early that Lightning would be his best friend. Mater did act a bit like a happy puppy in some scenes, even wagging his tow cable like a tail once or twice. Larry the Cable Guy did use his well known line once as the character as well as saying one or two other things that sounded like things he said in his comedy routines. The Sheriff was also an older car and he had trouble keeping up with Lightning when he ran. Red the town fire truck really didn’t say much. He did get emotional at times.

Flo owned the local diner and was loud. She was married to Ramone, a car that had hydraulics so he could raise up and down. He owned a car painting business and was constantly changing his paint color. Sarge was a military jeep that owned a surplus store that was right next to where Filmore sold his organic fuel. Sarge was always calling Filmore a hippy. Lizzie was a very old Model T type of car that talked to herself and was confused about a lot of things. She has been married to Stanley, the car that established the town. Luigi and Guido were brothers from Italy that owned the tire store in town. They followed European races and thought Ferrari made the best cars.

The King was a race car that was getting ready to retire after having won many races. He had a lot of fans and a sponsor that treated him very well. His wife was at the races and tended to worry about her husband. Richard Petty and his wife Lynda did the voices for those characters. Other actual NASCAR drivers like Darrell Waltrip, Dale Earnhardt JR., and Mario Andretti also provided voices for some of the cars. There may have been other real race car drivers involved, but since I don’t follow racing, I really don’t know for sure. Chick Hicks had spent most of his racing career coming in second behind the King. Chick was tired of that and determined to finally win a Piston Cup. He was willing to do anything to win. Michael Keaton did a good job with the voice.

Voice Talent

Mario Andretti - Mario Andretti
George Carlin - Filmore
Paul Dooley - Sarge
Dale Earnhardt JR. - Junior
Katherine Helmond - Lizzie
Bonnie Hunt - Sally Carrera
Michael Keaton - Chick Hicks
Richard Kind - Van
Larry the Cable Guy - Mater
Jay Leno - Jay Limo
Jennifer Lewis - Flo
Edie McClurg - Minny
Cheech Marin - Ramone
Paul Newman - Doc Hudson
Lynda Petty - Mrs. The King
Richard Petty - The King
Jeremy Piven - Harv
Guido Quaroni - Guido
Joe Ranft - Red/Peterbuilt
John Ratzenberger - Mack
Tony Shalhoub - Luigi
Owen Wilson - Lightning McQueen

John Lasseter - Director
Joe Ranft - Co-director

Pixar created another wonderful movie with Cars. The animation was amazing and the story, while not the most original, was told well in an entertaining way. This is a very good movie for families. People that like animated movies need to see this one. I wouldn’t hesitate to go see it again and will definitely be adding the DVD to my collection once it is out.

Pixar Movie Reviews
A Bug's Life ~ Finding Nemo ~ The Incredibles ~ Monsters, Inc. ~ Ratatouille ~ Toy Story ~ Toy Story 2 ~ Toy Story 3 ~ Up ~ WALL-E ~

Other Animated Movie Reviews
Beauty and the Beast ~ Brother Bear ~ Chicken Little ~ The Emperor's New Groove ~ Finding Nemo ~ Home on the Range ~ Hoodwinked ~ Ice Age ~ Ice Age: The Meltdown ~ Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius ~ Lilo & Stitch ~ Madagascar ~ Over the Hedge ~ The Polar Express ~ Robots ~ Shark Tale ~ Shrek ~ Shrek 2 ~ Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas ~ Sleeping Beauty ~ Tim Burton's Corpse Bride ~ Treasure Planet ~ Valiant ~ Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit ~ The Wild ~

Recommended: Yes