The Wait For Pixar's Return To Form Continues!

Rating: Null/10 (11 October 2013)

From the creators of animation classics like Toy Story trilogy, Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Ratatouille, WALL·E & Up, Pixar Animation Studios' 14th feature film marks their first foray into prequels & although it's an enjoyable, entertaining & quite satisfying ride for the most part, it ultimately falls short of the quality of cinema we expect from Pixar.
A prequel to Monsters Inc., Monsters University focuses on the relationship between Mike & Sulley during their college life, where they started off as rivals studying to be scarers. After the two are dropped from their courses for causing a fight, Mike takes part in Scary Games competition to prove his worth & reluctantly includes Sulley when his team falls short of one member.
Directed by Dan Scanlon, the story does add more dimensions to our beloved characters & captures the college atmosphere in a vivid manner but it really isn't a film that was needed in the first place. Still, it's better that they made a prequel instead of a sequel. The direction is good but the story lacks originality & unlike the best of Pixar films, doesn't bring anything new to the table.
The computer animation is top-level stuff, as expected from Pixar. The reprising characters have not lost any of their charm while the new ones are ingeniously envisioned, designed & rendered on the screen. The narrative follows a conventional route & is full of genre clichés yet the one aspect I liked most was what they did with the character arcs of Mike, Sulley & even Randy.
Mike is presented as a monster who's told by everyone that he doesn't belong, which fuels his desire to become something important & respectable, despite his irreplaceable flaws. Sulley, however, enters the college with lots of aura & pride surrounding his family name but soon experiences the burden of living up to a legacy. While Randy is given a sad portrait of an insecure loner who later gets seduced by the dark side.
There isn't much to complain in the technical categories either. Cinematography makes fine use of colour palette & camera movements are energetic. Editing paces the story nicely for its runtime is never felt, for the most part. Billy Crystal, John Goodman & Steve Buscemi do a great job in voicing their respective characters but it's Helen Mirren who surprises the most as Dean Hardscrabble. And Randy Newman is as amazing as always.
Certainly not in the league of the original, Monsters University is still an absolutely hilarious, unabashedly rib-tickling & wildly entertaining laughter riot that offers loads of fun to viewers of all ages while those expecting another path-breaking cinema from Pixar are destined to be disappointed. I doubt people would be complaining as much if this film was released by some other animation studio but since it's Pixar, anything less than great is disappointing.
On an overall scale, Monsters University is a wonderfully crafted tale about the beauty of friendship and provides a fascinating evolution of Mike & Sulley's relationship from hardcore rivals to inseparable friends. A roller-coaster ride of unlimited madness that will amaze the kids & take most grown-ups to a nostalgic tour of their college lives (hopefully) although I highly doubt that it will be remembered in the years to come. Worth a watch? The answer is a resounding yes.