Monsters Inc

The complaints of my nephew notwithstanding (his earlier comment that puppets are "gay" led to a very long lecture on homophobic language and his aesthetic immaturity), Monsters Inc remains one of my favourite films. Admittedly, that's a long list, but it's one of the few times that Billy Crystal is going to be part of a cavalcade that includes Pasolini and Jarman, as well as that Avengers movie.

Aside from a few moments of boastful CGI trickery - the close up of Sully's fur is very impressive, but adds little to the plot - Monsters Inc  is a prime example of how animation, the child of puppetry, can bridge the generation gap. My own childishness allows me to enjoy comic books, but Monsters Inc has both an intelligent message and a sense of fun that appeals to my two year old niece. Unlike most films with Billy Crystal, it's fast-paced enough to indulge slapstick without dropping the plot.

The plot is straight forward - the monsters are responsible for harvesting fear from children to get energy for their city. When it turns out that children's laughter is more potent, a nice allegory is set up: joy is more powerful than terror. This is then exercised across a series of chase scenes, a conspiracy theory and, in a post-modern touch, a comedy version of the plot made by the cast, in universe.

One of the themes that keeps resurfacing as I skitter around the web, researching puppetry, is the gap between high and low art: certain theatrical forms - even, surprisingly, ballet, seem to alternate between the two. Yet those qualities which seem to most set animation in the lower bracket, such as the tendency towards archetypal characterisation or the possibility of  presenting superhuman abilities, seems to lend them a power that goes beyond more respectable media. I adore the Iron Man movies, but the sight of Robert Downey flying is still a little absurd. The hyper realism of animation, ironically, makes the "special effects" appear less jarring.

The battle between high art and low art has taken a back seat following more engaged political critiques, exposed as either mere snobbery or a deliberate attempt to belittle working class entertainment. Of course, The Pavilion pantomime is always going to be disrespected by the same critics who ignore the complacency in other venue's productions and cabaret has been used as a term of disrespect by that prominent cultural commentator Gary Barlow, yet these responses are, frankly, out of date. Instead, there's an idea that certain art forms are less "mature." Monsters Inc, by being intelligent and wildly funny, is a case against the diminution of animation into the cultural ghetto of "for children."

Then again, without the idiocy of these categorisations, I wouldn't be able to find the manga comics in the "young readers" section of the library...