Movie Reaction: The Good Dinosaur

Formula: The Lion King + Rango + Up

[Voice] Cast: This is not the All Star affair that Inside Out was*. The main character, Arlo, is voiced by a kid I've never heard of (Raymond Ochoa). His brother is Junior from Blackish (Marcus Scribner) though, so that's kind of fun. Jeffrey Wright and Frances McDormand add some clout as the parents. Steve Zahn, Anna Paquin, and Sam Elliott are also there, doing their thing.

*Granted, Inside Out was only "All Star" if you watched NBC comedies in 2010.

Plot: In a world where the dinosaurs weren't wiped out, Arlo is a young __?__saurus, the runt of his litter. He's rather cowardly and  looking to make his Mark, a literal interpretation of the phrase, which is a sign of accomplishment in his family. One day, he has a run-in with a feral human named Spot. The two of them get very lost and must find their way home.

Thoughts:
I hate to repeat the same thing that every review has said about this movie, but it's pretty lean. The best Pixar movies create a world that is overflowing with ideas and characters and sight gags. This simply doesn't have that, which is somewhat understandable. This is an ancient world. There's no technology. It's nature and that's it. You can't fill it with human world touches like any of their other movies. As a result, I couldn't help but leave the movie feeling underfed.

That's not to say there aren't nice visuals. This is probably the prettiest movie Pixar has made. All the environments are beautifully rendered. I'd like to make desktop backgrounds of those landscape shots. It is a pretty movie and worth seeing for that if nothing else.

And what's there in the movie is good. The story is very touching, using familiar and effective beats that Disney loves to use. The room got dusty more than a couple times if you know what I mean. The characters are all lovable and I was never bored. There just wasn't much to it.

I know that this movie went through a lot in per-production (hence the release delay) and I wonder if it just reached a point where someone said "Don't worry about the details. Let's just get this made".

Elephant in the Room: Is Inside Out just making this look bad? It's true that Inside Out is the much superior movie. And they both have a similar structure - accident leads to a voyage back home. Even if this was paired with Cars 2, no one would mistake The Good Dinosaur with top tier Pixar. I am afraid I'm sounding too harsh though. I'd much rather have a movie that doesn't do much, like this, than one that goes in stupid directions, like Cars 2. This is just missing that X factor that makes it great.

To Sum Things Up:
The Good Dinosaur is a beautiful movie with very likable characters and a simple plot in an under-inhabited world. There's nothing about it that Pixar or Disney should be ashamed of. It's definitely worth seeing.

Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend