The Incredibles: DVD Review
March 20, 2005
Last year when I wrote my positive review of “The Incredibles” I said that it might not have been Pixar’s best film because it seemed to go on too long, with too many endings. At the time, I had seen “Finding Nemo” a good three times and was still in love with its beautiful underwater world and snappy characters, but time has passed, and now having seen Brad Bird’s Oscar-winner for a third time, on the sparkling new 2-disk DVD, I may have to revise my original thesis. Where ‘Nemo’ may be sweeter, “A Bug’s Life” may be brighter, and “Toy Story” may be funnier, “The Incredibles” is the only one that is genuinely adult, but upon first inspection, it’s a jarring, albeit technically stunning, experience- a two hour James Bond spoof that throws in middle age depression, suburban angst, teenage alienation, and Bergman-like marriage problems to sharpen up the effect of its 60’s-style ennui. But multiple viewings, as is the case with most great films (I’m still discovering new stuff in “Citizen Kane”, twenty viewings deep), gets a viewer beyond plot, script, and character development, making available a better understanding of the visual and personal stakes at play here- a family drama wrapped in a superhero satire with a twist of regret and rebirth thrown in for good cathartic measure. The kids, and adults alike, can still marvel with glee at Dash’s forest chase sequence, and tremble in terror at the mid-flight plane explosion, but tougher minded individuals can find a kind of touching psychological progression in Mr. Incredible’s confession to his wife that, given the recent turn of events, he isn’t strong enough to lose his family for a second time. If you take it at that, than “The Incredibles” is really a film about a 45-year-old man finding that life in Suburbia isn’t all that bad, as long as you be yourself, and the people you love are right by your side.
Beyond the pleasures the film offers in repeat viewings, the new DVD is flush with informative and funny extras that, all told, minus the two feature length commentary tracks, and added about ten hidden Easter Eggs, takes a full three hours to get through. Writer, director Brad Bird is all over the DVD, naturally, introducing each discarded deleted sequence (six in all, animated in storyboard form only), with an explanation to why he jettisoned the material. Some of the deleted material works well, like an alternate opening sequence where Helen and Bob try to fit in at a neighborhood barbeque, but let their alter-ego’s seep into their suburban character, fits the satire well, but not as good as the films ultimate beginning, though a scene where she confronts Bob about potential infidelity is surprisingly adult for an animated feature. Most of the 80-minutes of behind-the-scenes documentaries are about story conception and animation, which is appropriate, considering the film is unlike anything Pixar has made before, with lots of shadows, dark reds, and life-like humans, as opposed to toys, bugs, and fish. The new, fully animated sequence, “Jack-Jack Attack” fills in the story of the babysitter and her difficult night with the shape-shifting baby Parr, and Bud Luckey’s rhyming western short “Boundin’” is included, with commentary and a 4-minute feature on its creator.
All of these extras give us an inside look at how to make CGI films come to life, but the best extra, which has gotten the most praise of any from various DVD reviewers thus far, is the hand drawn 4-minute “lost cartoon”, “Mr. Incredible and Pals”, a purposefully awful “Batman”-style camp-fest starring Mr. I, Frozone, and a mute rabbit named Mr. Skipperdoo. The cartoon, bad animation with human lips, is funny as it is, but the provided commentary from Mr. Incredible and Frozone (Craig T. Nelson, Samuel L. Jackson), seeing the cheaply produced segment for the first time, is downright hilarious. Frozone complains that his likeness looks too white and puzzles at Mr. Skipperdoo (“What’s with the rabbit?”), and Mr. Incredible apologizes, saying he was told the process was supposed to be state-of-the-art. “This thing should have never seen the light of day,” says Frozone before storming out of the recording session. Yes, but as an extra to an already established masterpiece of modern animation, it couldn’t be more nostalgically amusing. Old school satire from new school animators applied to old school animation is retro comedy at its best, and this superb DVD is stuffed to the brim.
“The Incredibles” DVD is available practically everywhere for under 20 bucks.
by Adam Suraf