A fun and cutesy but unfortunately sleep inducing movie, unsuitable for kids

Rating: 6/10 (12 July 2010)

A formula is great thing, it helps you solve complex problems in a simplistic, time efficient manner but unfortunately the same is not true for movie making and once again Pixar has used the same old Toy Story formula of "save my plastic back(side)" in this movie too. A movie which starts pleasantly dims off to a sleep inducing monotone by the end and you find yourself scratching your head thinking "déjà vu" by the middle but because you're in a cinema you keep quiet and lull yourself off into a numb surrender instead.
The movie entrées with the toys all warring with each other and before you gasp in horror and disbelief or question why you realise it's just Andy playing with his toys, probably for the last time since he's going to college soon. The sequence is creative and playful and forces out a chuckle or two, but as soon as it's over things go pear shaped. Queue the separation sequence. Whereas in previous Toys Stories it's one toy lost, everybody save, it seems the bigger budget and new technology has helped Pixar to think outside their box a little, but still only just far enough to keep them still sitting in its shadow. Instead of one toy lost, it's now many toys lost and instead of everybody helps to save one toy lost, it's now one toy saves the playground (so to speak) and hey presto you have your classic Hollywood "one man saves the world" movie, but with toys instead.
The classic characters are all still "real" and believable and no one is missing (which is good), the new toys are also very well done, funny and how you would probably imagine them to be if they were really alive (how cool would that be!). The voiceovers are great and the humans are surprisingly well done too, unlike TS1 and TS2 where detail to them was cunningly skimmed over.
Again, things turn nasty with the introduction of Mr Hitler pink teddy! A predictably kind and wise old ring leader with evil eugenically inspired intentions, the textbook villain for our hero toys to escape from and all the while wholly inappropriate for the young in the auditorium! A quick glance at my neighbours qualified the fact that if this sequence had gone on any longer we would have had a few crying kids on our hands. And the terminator Chucky doll didn't exactly help roses bloom in my heart!
Basically, Pixar has pulled an offensive hand gesture to their target audience on this one and just regurgitated and older toy story with 3D effects. Which on further inspection was shamefully weak and uninspiring anyway; as I have had said before, I don't want to be sitting with my face melting in my hand during a 3D movie, get the audience moving, ducking and dodging! I for one would expect the medium of animation as one which can truly stretch this technology to its limits (again, go watch the 3D show at Thorpe park), seems like Hollywood is fresh out of revolutionaries and there are now none to the likes of the Wachowski Brothers left.
My advice and closing comment, if you are ten or less, you'll be crying watching this so get mummy or daddy to fast forward the scary bits and if you're a parent your nippers will be crying, so fast forward the scary bits, if you're a teenager or anything else you'll probably enjoy this movie, more so if you're tipsy or have an IQ <100.