Oddly enough, truly great...

Rating: 10/10 (1 December 2002)

I've posted a comment on Monsters Inc. before, but I wanted to follow up from the perspective of multiple viewings (my 2 year old daughter has taken to this movie like nothing else *grin*).
*POSSIBLE SPOILERS*
As much as I enjoyed Monsters Inc. on the first few viewings, imagine my amazement when I started seeing actual SUBTEXT in this cartoon.
Okay, so the "accidental fatherhood" theme has appeared in many other movies (Three Men and a Baby comes to mind), but it works here, and is referred to in the script a couple of times. Monster Sully really becomes a "father-figure" to the little girl who accidentally makes her way to Monstropolis, and passes through the same stages many real fathers do, from utter terror to affection to love. The strongest element in Monsters Inc is that it's very easy to believe in the relationship between Sully and "Boo" (the name he eventually gives the child, to buddy Mike's dismay). When Sully inadvertantly scares the girl in a demo for new trainees his dismay is convincing and heart-breaking. The scene where Sully finally returns "Boo" to her own room is really an understated, emotional masterpiece, from the girl's initial glee at being home (and the way she shows off all her toys to her new friend Sully--a marvellous detail) to Sully's heavy-hearted exit. A nice detail about that exit--the animators may have been tempted to show a teardrop fall from Sully's eye, but instead we just see his eyes visibly moisten as he turns to go. I loved it.
The point that "laughter is ten times more powerful than scream" is actually a lovely touch, carrying the implication that a cooperative solution is always preferable to a confrontational one. Even better, while this message is made distinctly, it isn't stated overbearingly. It's a nice message for parents and labor negotiators alike. It might be stretching, but I think there's even an environmental implication to this message that's not stated directly in the movie, but definitely seems to be alluded to.
More unstated messages come from Mr. Waternoose (of course voiced masterfully by the late James Coburn). In the commentary track on the DVD director Pete Docter notes that Coburn brought a warmth and a vulnerability to the character that none of the writers had seen, and that kind of added dimension makes him that much more powerful as a villain. He also represents a dangerous resistance to change, and to adopt a cooperative solution in favor of one that's even more exploitive; Waternoose's idea of innovation is not just to continue victimizing children, but to escalate that victimization to an unspeakable new level.
Okay, okay... I might just have too much time on my hands to start reading these messages into Monsters Inc, but I swear they're here. And I don't think there's QUITE this much depth to, say, Shrek (which I continue to like a lot, BTW) or A Bug's Life or the Toy Story movies (which I also love, but for different reasons). ...And another note on the music: while Randy Newman's theme song "If I Didn't Have You" is pretty much a rehash of a lot of other songs he's done in the last decade or so, his score for Monsters Inc is marvellous. His theme for the little girl is rendered in a few different ways, and the simple piano version that plays in the pivotal "return" scene is just plain wonderful. And the swinging, big-band style score for the scenes in the Monsters Inc plant are very catchy.
Yes, I think Monsters Inc. is a genuinely great movie. But I feel a little funny admitting that :-)