A Life Through Film #006: Toy Story
Let's revisit a major influence on both the 21st Century and my own life.
Release Date: 11/22/1995
First Weekend At Number One: 11/22/1995
Weeks at Number One: 4
Thanks for reading! This is my ongoing series where I track the evolution of American culture in my life by reviewing every number one film at the weekend box office since I was born in chronological order. If you haven’t already, I highly recommend reading my introduction post here.
In 2022, something unexpected happened with the release of Minions 2: The Rise of Gru into theaters. A trend of videos emerged on platforms like TikTok and Twitter showing young men dressing in full suits and meeting each other at the theater to enjoy the animated movie as “gentlemen.”
Of course, their definition of gentlemanly behavior was a bit skewed: reports of loud cheering mid-movie and bananas being thrown at the screen at various points in the film more resembled a midnight screening of The Room, not the latest tentpole animated release for a major studio [The Room is a 4.5/5. Yes,I’m serious].
The #Gentleminions trend was organized in online teen spaces I don’t occupy since I’m an adult man who pays taxes, but I immediately understood some of the reasons behind it. For one, it’s fun to misattribute something low brow as ironically high brow. I once had the idea for a benefit event in college where people would dress in black tie attire to dine on trays of bagel bites and mini hot dogs. But these crowds of teenage boys meeting up with their friends to make an event of the new Minions/Despicable Me weren’t doing this for just any animated feature film.
These were guys who had literally been raised on this franchise. Since 2010 with the release of the first Despicable Me, these movies and their spinoffs have been nothing but massive box office showing after massive box office showing despite annoying adults with every entry. With that level of ubiquity, I imagine that for a lot of those besuited teenagers in 2022, the first theatrical release in the series since the end of COVID-19 restrictions brought with it a tangible feeling of both comfort and excitement.
I haven’t seen any of the Despicable Me movies, but I can’t pretend I’m better than those teenage boys were in 2022. After all, as a teenager in 2010, I went to the theater to eagerly watch the theatrical return of the animated franchise I had been raised on, Toy Story.
The story of Woody (voiced by Tom Hanks) and Buzz Lightyear (voiced by Tim Allen) surviving adversity on their way to becoming best friends is, without a doubt, the most significant film I’ve written about so far for this column. It would be one thing if this were just the first feature film to be fully animated with computer graphics, which it is. Maybe just as importantly though, Toy Story launched multiple media empires that still exist today. On top of starting an IP that would retain its strength for decades, the movie made the studio that made it and its director household names.
The original Toy Story was a big deal to me long before I ever recognized that it was a big deal for movies in general. It was the first movie I ever saw in theaters. Granted, I was two months old and, according to my mom, slept through the whole screening like a tiny angel, so I don’t remember it at all. But I like to think the movie’s special brand of imagination and humor imprinted onto me just the same. Once I was an actually cognizant child, the movie (and its sequel at that point) kept a tight grip on me via VHS copies that were in constant rotation.
Speaking from experience, Toy Story contains everything a kid could ever want in a movie. The colors are bright, the characters look cool and say funny things, the plot is easy to follow, and best of all, they’re toys. Before video games ruined my ability to use my imagination, playing with toys was the first activity where I felt like I could develop creative instincts and ideas. A whole movie that not only depicted that, but also assured me that my toys were absolutely psyched to be part of it validated my positive behavior as a young child.
The technical importance of Toy Story was always a secondary concern to me as a kid; by the time I could understand what it had done for the medium of animation, there were plenty of CG animated movies in the world, both by Pixar and its rival studios. As an adult though, I can’t help but be absolutely blown away by Toy Story as a groundbreaking technical achievement. In college I did a small amount of 3D modeling and animation for a class I had to take. I spent weeks planning, storyboarding, modeling, blocking, and keying to end up with a crude animation of a robot floating through a house that lasted less than a minute.
After doing that, the idea of making a full animated feature, especially one with any level of quality to it, seemed like an impossible task for anyone to accomplish, despite decades of proof to the contrary. Discovering the history of how the first one was made back in the early 90s was both an inspiring treat and a new source of imagery fodder for my anxiety nightmares.
Unfortunately, we can’t dive into the story of that production without acknowledging some very toxic and upsetting behavior. The story of Toy Story and Pixar as a whole is tied to its director and founder respectively, John Lasseter. For years considered the patron saint of 3D animation, in 2017 Lasseter was exposed for years of sexual misconduct around the offices that he had helped start and lead. So frequently was he trying to grab and hug women he worked with that Disney and Pixar had to hire special minders to “rein in his impulses.” The legendary animator left Pixar in a cloud of shame that year, though he later joined Skydance as the head of their animation division.
Lasseter has been extremely apologetic since his transgressions came to light, both publicly and, from what I can gather, privately. Still, while he was working firsthand on some of the most critically acclaimed and commercially successful animated films of the past half century, John Lasseter spent years making Pixar and Disney Animation hostile environments for many women to work in. It’s an unfortunate truth that will hang over every movie he was a part of during his career, including Toy Story.
The origins of Toy Story date back to 1982. Lasseter, a young animator at Disney Animation Studios, had just watched TRON in theaters with fellow animator Glen Keane1. The two men were blown away by the live-action film’s revolutionary use of computer graphics for special effects and backgrounds, even feeling a bit depressed over the realization that one day, the technology would surely supplant traditional 2D animation.
[Two things are true about TRON: The movie has a unique and groundbreaking aesthetic, which when combined with its revolutionary use of special effects make it wholly singular to this day. But also, there are whole swaths of the movie that look like ass now. 3/5]
Excited by the potential for the tech, Lasseter and Keane decided to put together a demo for a potential use of 3D computer modeling in Disney’s animated films. Basing the short reel on Where the Wild Things Are, the 1982 test animation uses computer renders for the backgrounds while traditional hand drawn animation is layered over top of it. The results don’t look amazing decades later, but by Lasseter’s own words, that was the point. “In five years,” he said at the time, “These tests will seem so primitive, they’ll look like Steamboat Willie does today.”
The Disney executives were extremely excited by the Wild Things test, and were in talks with Lasseter to use the technique in an adaptation of The Brave Little Toaster that he would direct. However, in his eagerness over the new tech, Lasseter had gone around his superiors at Disney Animation Studios, upsetting quite a few powerful figures in the division. The studio ended up passing on the Toaster film, and Lasseter was fired in 1983.
[Friend of Lasseter and fellow animator Jerry Rees ended up directing The Brave Little Toaster for Hyperion Pictures in 1987. It’s a 2.5/5.]
Lasseter ended up at Lucasfilm, joining their Computer Graphics Project to help the team with combining their groundbreaking 3D rendering software with creative storytelling techniques. In 1984, they released The Adventures of Andre & Wally B. This 2 minute short was the first of its kind: a comedic, narrative, character-focused computer animation. Despite its brevity and primitive appearance, the short was a groundbreaking proof of concept. Here were the principles of animation effectively working with the new tools of the computer age!
The Lucasfilm team continued breaking ground in the world of computer graphics by contributing special effects to feature length films. In 1985, Young Sherlock Holmes was the first live action film to feature a fully rendered 3D character. The movie’s stained glass knight menaced its way into the history books, another feather in the cap for Lasseter and his team.
In February of ‘86, Lasseter and the rest of the Lucasfilm Computer Graphics Project spun the team off into its own company with the financial help of Steve Jobs. Jobs, freshly fired from Apple, invested $10 million up front to help the team buy the technology they were using and get set up as an animation studio. Over the next five years, Jobs would invest an additional $40 million into the new company, now called Pixar.
Pixar began to grow, adding new animation pros like Pete Docter and Andrew Stanton, both of whom would go on to direct features for the company in the future. In addition to regular commercial work to pay the bills, the company continued to put out annual short films, each aiming to show that a cartoon rendered by a computer could still elicit the same emotional punch as one drawn by hand. The first of these, Luxo Jr., also served as the source of the studio’s mascot.
In 1988, Pixar released their third short film, Tin Toy. The cartoon, centered on a sentient toy at odds with the baby that wants to play with it, was a critical smash and many people’s first introduction to Pixar’s work. I think it’s held up as a short, but its animation is certainly dated.
The baby in it, the first attempt at a realistic human in a Pixar project, looks absolutely horrifying, but after researching the short’s production, I’m positive that was intentional. After all, we’re seeing the baby from the perspective of the scared toy. Ergo, scary baby. This idea of character and story informing design, as well as the general concept of sentient toys and their relationships with humans, would be something that Pixar carried forward to their next project.
Tin Toy won the Oscar for Best Animated Short in 1988, the first for a fully CG cartoon. It also got the attention of Lasseter’s old employer, Disney. Impressed by what they had seen from his work at Pixar, the House of Mouse tried to lure him back to their animation department by promising to let him direct his first feature film. Feeling a sense of loyalty to his team and Steve Jobs, though, Lasseter stayed with Pixar.
Instead, Steve Jobs and Jeffrey Katzenberg, head of Disney Animation, struck a unique deal. Pixar would work on a CG animated project for Disney, who would distribute it to a larger audience. This was just another piece of history for Toy Story to be involved in. Eschewing decades of their own practices, Disney allowed an external studio to work on a project of their own, calling only for some creative oversight and regular progress reports.
The initial plan was for Pixar to make a 30 minute special for ABC, with A Tin Toy Christmas as the primary concept. With what I imagine to be a deeply mischievous gleam in his eye, Katzenberg pointed out that if the team was making the jump from 5 minutes to 30 minutes, they may as well make the jump from 5 minutes to feature length. In for a penny, in for a pound.
In 1991, production officially began on Toy Story, with Lasseter overseeing the project as director.
When you make history, the process rarely goes smoothly. The years of work that went into Pixar’s first movie have filled multiple books and documentaries, both because of its importance but also its challenges. Despite their experience making animated shorts, the creative minds at the studio had never used their modeling and rendering software to make a feature film. No one had. They had to figure it out.
A great thing about the production of Toy Story is that the revolutionary nature of it was secondary to the team behind it. The focus for the creatives at Pixar was creating an entertaining and compelling animated feature first, changing the landscape of film second. After all, they had seen what happened to movies that are mostly known for being firsts in the world of special effects: TRON and Young Sherlock Holmes were financial disappointments that, at best, lived on as cult curios (this was before the recent TRON sequels). Lasseter, Docter, Stanton, and the rest of the creatives at Pixar knew that if they wanted to make a movie that people actually enjoyed, it had to start with the story.
Initially, Lasseter and the team made heavy use of the creative notes they were getting from Katzenberg. The Disney exec saw their initial progress on the story of a cowboy doll and a spaceman action figure having to work together and called for it to be edgier. Katzenberg wanted the characters meaner and the plot points more shocking (for a kids movie, anyway). Even though the Pixar team admitted later that they didn’t agree with the notes, they implemented them into their story anyway.
In an important moment for both Toy Story itself and Pixar as a studio, a test reel heavily influenced by Katzenberg’s notes was shown to the suits at Disney on November 19, 1993. Known by Pixar as the Black Friday reel, this version of Toy Story does not work. The characters, especially Woody, are cruel and unlikable. The dialogue is dishearteningly mean. How could these characters grow to like one another as friends?
I’m baffled by Katzenberg’s ideas. Disney Animation was in the middle of a literal renaissance period, driven by the success of movies like The Little Mermaid [3.5/5], Aladdin [3.5/5], and Beauty and the Beast [4.5/5]. They were about to release The Lion King [4/5] out into the world! Clearly Katzenberg wasn’t telling the teams behind these projects to get edgy; their whole appeal was tapping into an earnest belief in the magic and wonder of animation. Perhaps he had different thoughts on what “cutting-edge” means.
Toy Story’s 20 minute test animation was so poorly received internally that Disney was going to cancel the whole project. Feeling a desperate need to not be rejected by the company for a second time in his career, Lasseter pushed back and got the team an extra two weeks to redo the story their own way. Pixar worked manically to fix what had been broken. They removed the cynicism from the story, focusing instead on characters that weren’t perfect, but tried their best to be good.
A screening of a new test animatic showing Pixar’s creative direction worked. Disney believed in Lasseter and team’s vision and reaffirmed their support for the project financially. Pixar moved forward with production, never again concerning themselves with the creative concerns of outside parties (at least, not for a while anyway).
So far I’ve written about 2400 words about Toy Story and haven’t even begun talking about the movie itself. Normally, when I talk around a movie like this, it’s because I don’t find the final product all that interesting or worth talking about. Rest assured, this is not the case here. It’s been tough for me to write about this movie because I don’t know if I can even view it as a subjective work of art with its own merits and demerits. The entire Toy Story franchise is too ingrained in my brain for me to take a step back and look at it as just a movie.
Watching it back this time around, I tried paying attention more to the technical aspects of the production (especially since every line of the narrative is deeply familiar to me by this point). I remain shocked that the CG visuals on display have aged as well as they have. They don’t compare to your modern Disney or Pixar fare, but Tin Toy from only a few years earlier looks so antiquated now, so it can’t just be that toys being the main characters is the key.
The technical staff at Pixar knew the limitations of what they were working with, and made smart choices to cover for them. Obviously, the benefit of making the subjects of the film toys is that their plasticky, smooth sheen works well with the limited rendering ability of the time. To mask that simpler rendering further, the technical artists use distinct lighting choices to either wash the characters out or bathe them in deep, lush colors. The scene of Woody pushing Buzz out the window, in particular, depicts Andy’s room in a beautiful moment of nostalgic twilight.
The art style doesn’t aim for realism, even though the story ostensibly takes place in our reality. Instead, the zoomed out depictions of childhood bedrooms, suburban homes, and the night sky in Toy Story capture the essence of our reality, the version of those things that exist in our mind as childhood memories: lacking in details but beautiful to dream about.
That’s not to say every environment in the film is a Wes Anderson-esque diorama of perfect order. When the camera is on the toys’ level, scuff marks on the baseboard and slightly uneven wooden floorboards become massive parts on the environment, selling both the scale and lived-in nature of primary settings like Andy and Sid’s bedrooms, as well as short term locations such as the DinoCo gas station and Pizza Planet, one of my favorite fake restaurants in all of fiction. What kid wouldn’t want to go to a pizza arcade with multiple games themed after the Alien franchise!
Speaking of the movie’s presentation, I was not surprised to discover that I am still easily manipulated by hearing Randy Newman’s “You’ve Got a Friend In Me.” The deliberate choice to not make Toy Story a musical and instead have Newman write a few original pieces based on the emotion of a scene was entirely correct, even if two of the three songs only really work in the context of the scene that they play over.
At the Oscars that year, Newman was nominated for Best Original Song for “You’ve Got a Friend In Me” but lost to “Colors of the Wind” from Pocahontas. Great song, not better than the Newman’s though.
I’m writing a lot about this movie assuming you know the gist of the story and characters. Is that rude? I’m sorry. If you’re looking for a full plot recap this deep into the review I don’t know what to tell you, except that I’m also sorry for owning a VHS copy of Toy Story as a child.
I think this movie works narratively on almost every level. The main plot, though straightforward, allows for dynamic development of our protagonists as they weave ever closer in their arcs to friendship. Many of the side characters aren’t afforded this level of development, but they make up for it with many lines of snappy dialogue that have remained in my personal lexicon for life (specifically, Rex’s “It’s a what?! WHAT IS IIIIIIIIT?” and Sid’s “Alright, double prizes!” come out of my mouth with embarrassing frequency).
The stellar voicework by everyone in the cast helps to elevate the already killer script. Hanks and Allen are incredible, of course, but special mention must be made of Wallace Shawn’s Rex. If you look at it by proportion of lines in the movie that are clever jokes delivered well, he may actually be the funniest character in a movie filled with funny characters.
One thing I somehow missed in all these years of watching this movie is that Joss Whedon, another creative later accused of creating hostile working environments for women, is the main credited screenwriter for Toy Story. He was brought in as a consultant after the initial drafts of the script were done in order to fix it. Whedon later went on to say that the original drafts by Joel Cohen and Alec Sokolow were straight up “rotten.” Given what I’ve seen from the Black Friday screening, I wouldn’t disagree.
Some of Whedon’s major contributions to the story include the characters of Rex and Bo Peep, as well as the wrinkle of Buzz not knowing he’s a toy for most of the film, a brilliant choice that drives a huge amount of the interpersonal conflict between him and Woody. As I mentioned, Rex is incredible, and a brilliant display of design informing narrative. A cheap, plastic tyrannosaurus rex feeling insecure about himself as a ferocious beast is a wonderful piece of writing that makes the character feel so natural, despite his artificiality.
The only thing about the story I don’t love is Sid, the antagonist of the film. Sure, he’s a shitty kid who tortures and destroys toys, but the impact of his villainy is lessened by the fact that he doesn’t know the toys are alive until he receives his terrifying comeuppance. If anything, I feel a bit bad for the guy. There are implications in the film of his home life not being the most stable, so he expresses himself by bullying those weaker than him in his sister and the toys he acquires.
I’m actually a bit impressed by Sid’s ingenuity as an adult viewer. The chimera toys he creates all look awesome, with cohesive designs that, in-universe, he clearly put a lot of thought into. The final product is ugly, but the intentionality of its ugliness makes it admirable. In one behind-the-scenes documentary I watched, the Pixar animators even admitted to a sense of kinship with Sid, saying that if he were real he probably would have grown up to be an animator at the studio.
The climax of the movie isn’t the toys getting one over on Sid. The real foe that the characters have to conquer, of course, is insecurity and jealousy. The emotional high point of the movie is Woody and Buzz finally working together to get back to Andy, accepting their place in the world by utilizing their strengths as toys. The scene of the two of them “falling with style” still brings a small tear to my eye, and it’s earned its place in the b-roll of iconic Disney moments.
It’s unthinkable in hindsight, but Toy Story was not pegged to be a major success by almost anyone. Toy companies weren’t eager to license out the original toy designs, Steve Jobs wasn’t convinced the movie would be a hit until just before release, and initial test screenings only did okay. Jobs said before opening weekend that if the movie made over $100 million, both Pixar and Disney would make some money on it.
Toy Story ended up grossing $300 million, about half of which was during the twilight weeks of 1995. The movie topped the weekend box office for 4 weekends, stayed in the top 10 of the charts until February of ‘96, and was a consistent presence in theaters until the April following its release. Despite releasing so late in the year, Toy Story was the third highest grossing movie of 1995, behind summer powerhouses Batman Forever and Apollo 13 [4/5].
Sometimes I have to dig deep to figure out the cultural reason behind a film’s success. I could point out that Disney had a better track record around this time than at any other point in their history, leading to a strong opening weekend out of faith in the studio. I could also point out that the percentage of Americans with computers in the home was on the rise, leading to increased interest in the technology behind Toy Story. I could even talk about the philosophical questions raised by the movie that reward repeat viewings and discussions with others (the toys don’t worship the kids, but they see their duty to them as sacrosanct; do they subscribe to Catholic ideas of holy vocations? Is this sense innate? Is Buzz’s self-actualization a process every toy goes through?).
If Toy Story had merely been the first of its kind and under the Disney umbrella, it would have led the Box Office on its release weekend without question. The reason it stuck around and became such a success is obvious though: every part of the movie is excellent for all audiences. The kids can laugh at the jokes and fall deeper in love with playing with their toys, and the adults can marvel at the technology on display and remember the beauty of childhood.
One could argue that in its first few weeks, Toy Story didn’t face much competition. It premiered against Money Train and Casino, both of which had more limited audiences due to their R rating. In subsequent weeks its only real competition was Father of the Bride Part II, which debuted in second against Toy Story’s third week on top. I don’t think it’s out of line to point out that the movie had lackluster rivals to its throne, but I’d also argue that the long term success of Pixar’s film through the end of the year, into 1996, and well past the new millennium are proof positive that it could have thrived in most any market.
Reviews at the time were, of course, glowing, with the film still sitting at 100% on Rotten Tomatoes. Roger Ebert gave the film 4 stars out 4, praising the voicework by Allen and Hanks and the story as elements that elevated the film beyond impressive tech demo. Other outlets like CNN and Variety had nothing but high marks for the film, with the latter doing a good job breaking down the emotional film-making on display and not just ogling the CG.
The movie won basically every Annie Award2 in existence. In addition to Randy Newman’s two nominations at the 1996 Oscars for “You’ve Got a Friend In Me” and the rest of his score for the film, Toy Story was also nominated for Best Original Screenplay, the first time any animated film had received that honor. Though the writing team lost that award to The Usual Suspects [4.5/5], Lasseter and the rest of Pixar were honored with a special technical Oscar to commemorate their incredible achievement in animation.
That new technology helped get people to look, but eyes have been on Toy Story and Pixar as a studio for nearly 30 years now because of the care that went into crafting a great animated film that just happened to be made with computers. Lasseter and the team at Pixar were now made men in the world of animated features. I will be writing about their work for many more years to come.
Rating: 4.5/5
What Else Was At The Theater?
Toy Story topped the weekend box office for three weekends straight, then came back and topped it again a couple of weeks later over the long New Years weekend. A few of the premieres it beat that last weekend of ‘95 will eventually be covered in this column, but one that won’t was Four Rooms.
This anthology comedy is comprised of four segments, each directed by a different filmmaker. Though it has a fun cast and the segments directed by Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez are alright, the other two segments are quite bad, to the point where they drag the whole thing down for me. It’s a 1.5/5.
Next Week: It’s time for some tasteful horror for kids as we look back at Jumanji!
See you then!
-Will
Yes, there is a relation! For those unaware, Glen is my Dad’s cousin. He’s such an important figure when talking about Disney Animation in the ‘90s that it feels insane to just have him as a footnote here, but he’ll get his day in the spotlight in this column.
The Annie Awards is the long-running Hollywood awards show that recognizes excellence in animation in both television and film