Every week at SiftPop.com, we challenge our writers to come up with their favorite answer to a movie-related prompt tied to a recent release. This week, with the release of Inside Out 2, we’re discussing some of our favorite theatrical Pixar shorts! Let us know your favorites @SiftPop!
Who doesn’t love a beautiful little story about love? Pixar has made such a big impact on the world of animation, especially animated short films. They take important themes and ideas and portray them with meaningful metaphors, like the universal experience of love between two volcanoes. Lava is a beautiful little film about a lovestruck volcano looking for a volcano to love him back. The story is simple, but the visuals are gorgeous. This film shows off beautiful water and trees which feel so real. Then it has the cute faces of our volcanoes, which come to life in such a moving way. There are some strong emotional moments, from joy to sadness, and they will last with you for time after. Specifically, the music is so gorgeous and moving that it will completely sweep you away. The song (which lasts the whole film) is sweet and moving and it will be hard to let it go. (Shane Conto)
The first Oscar win for the studio, Tin Toy was written and directed by Pixar legend, John Lasseter. Released in 1988, it’s very much an early example of what the studio would be capable of. It tells the tale of a band toy that overcomes his initial fear of a rambunctious baby and learns about his desire to be played with. Though it’s much more bare-boned and simple (with an absolutely terrifying baby), it’s a fun precursor to what would be their first animated feature in Toy Story, including the introduction of a whole community of personified toys. (Jake Bourgeois)
It’s hard to believe the same year Care Bears Movie II, The Great Mouse Detective, and An American Tail hit theaters, Luxo Jr. was debuting at the SIGGRAPH computer graphics conference to showcase the abilities of the new computers and rendering software of a freshly formed company named Pixar. While it was never meant to generate revenue as a product, Pixar quickly realized the value of their CGI developments in the cinematic world. Clocking in at just two minutes, Luxo Jr. manages not only to tell a complete story, but make the audience connect and have feelings for the main character, the Luxo desk lamp, which now serves as the mascot for the thriving studio. Who would have thought that almost 40 years later, this quirky short film would still delight animation fans with a style and execution that hold up well against the plethora of family-oriented schlock being pumped out across the many CGI content mediums available? Disney may have started with a mouse, but Pixar definitely started with a spunky little lamp. (Patrice Downing)
Made before Pixar had released any feature-length films, Knick Knack doesn’t carry the same emotional weight that many of the company’s other shorts, but it does have a decent level of dark comedy. The style of humor gives off an unmistakable Looney Tunes vibe; I was almost expecting the TNT the snowman uses to say “ACME” on the side. Like many Pixar shorts, there is no dialogue, and the story’s emotion is expressed through the animation of the snowman’s eyes and mouth. I particularly like his reaction when he tries and fails to use his carrot nose as a chisel, and the pieces of coal that form his mouth group together to express his disappointment. Whatever they made that snow globe out of, they need to start using it on phone screens. The experience of watching this with a group of people back in 2003 before Finding Nemo added to the impact of the ending for me. When the snow globe drops down on the snowman, leaving him trapped once again, the audience lets out a collective cry of agony. We only watch the snowman battle to escape for four minutes, but we feel every second of his frustration. (John Tillyard)
What was so unique about The Blue Umbrella when it played in front of Monster’s University in 2013 was that the visuals looked extremely real, as if to fool you into thinking it was a live action story, yet still unmistakably animated. As with most Pixar shorts, it’s a story absent of dialogue, relying on the color and lights, the sights and sounds of a rain-drenched cityscape, and the music by Jon Brion with Sarah Jaffe vocals to elicit an emotional response amidst a powerfully lulling ambience. In a sea of black umbrellas, this story of boy meets girl bursts open as the boldly colored blue umbrella springs to life, quickly spotting the red object of his affection. Their mutual nervousness at meeting is cute, and it’s when the dismay that Blue and the city characters — awnings, gutters, mailboxes, and crosswalk signs — feel as the two umbrellas’ paths diverge that you’re hit with an overwhelming concern for what will becomes of their romance. Director Saschka Unseld described the six-minute short as “a love declaration to the rain,” and indeed it’s the thundering rainstorm that brings to life the ambition of Blue and the enthusiastic smiles of normally inanimate objects one can find in the city. The Blue Umbrella may not be the most profound or funny short that Pixar has ever given us free with admission, but it is a visual feast for your eyes, will leave you with a smile on your face, and above all can be remembered for its sweetness. (Jonathan Fedee)
Released in 2018 in front of Incredibles 2, Domee Shi’s Bao is, like much of Pixar’s catalog, a testament to how animation can be uniquely utilized to facilitate emotional storytelling. Set in Toronto, Bao tells the story of an older Chinese-Canadian woman living a quiet, lonely life which is suddenly revitalized when a bao that she had prepared for dinner comes to life. Over the course of the short, we see this baoby grow from infancy into adulthood, increasingly desiring independence from the mother character. This comes to a head when the bao wants to move out with his new girlfriend, prompting his mother to eat him to avoid being plunged into loneliness once again. Moments later, the mother awakes in a fright, revealing that this had all been an allegorical dream for her relationship with her own human son, who coincidentally has come over to attempt to reconcile their relationship. On the surface, Bao is a cute little story with a surprising twist, but once you get past the initial shock value there’s a really emotional story about strained familial relationships and the trauma that we can unknowingly inflict on one another. (Jake Hjort)
Premiering before Up, Partly Cloudy was written and directed by Peter Sohn, who would later go on to direct The Good Dinosaur and Elemental. This short personifies the clouds as entities that give life and help the storks deliver babies, whether human or animals. The short focuses on one cloud that has a particular set of skills in creating life that tortures his poor stork partner. As we’ve come to expect from the studio, there’s so much good character emoting with just sounds and faces. I could feel the bird’s pain through the screen and the betrayal the poor cloud felt when he felt abandoned. It is a recipe for success that they get right time after time. (Jake Bourgeois)
Day & Night is directed and co-written by Teddy Newton. Newton has stuck mainly to shorts and not gotten his feature chance yet, and this short is the lone writing credit for Karen Paik. It earned an Oscar nomination and showed ahead of Toy Story 3. Though they don’t have any involvement, this very much feels similar to Elemental. With the personification of the two entities, there’s some great use of negative space, as only the areas with the characters are animated. It’s very cleverly done, particularly once the duo starts interacting and portraying the same space hours apart. The sounds are taken exclusively from what’s shown in their body, which makes for a funny use of sound design. It’s a clever use of both sounds and visuals as the opposites eventually find the beauty in what the other has to offer. (Jake Bourgeois)
For the Birds is a super brief and super cute tale about the consequences of bullying and not accepting someone different than your flock. There isn’t a lot to hang your hat on here other than seeing the inevitable outcome of actions taken by the flock. As usual, the animation is great, and I really like the directing choices. For the Birds is something to show your kids, especially if they have short attention spans, and you want to plant the seeds for them to see further great animated works with the family. (Adam Ritchie)
La Luna was the accompanying short for 2021’s direct to streaming Pixar hit, Luca. It is a brief tale about a boy coming of age as he is taught by his elders how to harness and harvest the moon, or “La Luna.” As you would expect, this is beautifully animated, and as Pixar does Pixar things, it manages to give us something deeper and more meaningful than the surface would suggest. Sold by being completely dialogue free, the stunning score, art, and character work are enough to lift your spirits and keep you entertained. (Adam Ritchie)
A magician and his adorable rabbit. Presto is extremely Loony Toons leaning; even the score gives off Loony Tunes vibes, which is very odd in a Disney product. However, that is all the better for it ,as the hapless, or even helpless, magician is overshadowed by his intelligent but bitterly caged creature. Upstaging and pranking the magician at every turn, young ones would be sure to adore this for its slapstick brilliance and old fashioned fun that harkens back to the traditional days of animation. A fun five minutes indeed. (Adam Ritchie)
Remember the guy who cleaned and fixed Woody for Al in Toy Story 2? Well, that guy was actually introduced in a 1997 Pixar short called Geri’s Game. The title character is an old man who goes to a park for a game of chess — only, there’s no one there to play him. So thanks to schizophrenia, general old age, a broader sense of whimsy, or some combination of the three, Geri finds himself playing chess against, well, himself, with the reward for the winner being his own dentures. Geri’s Game is such a fun short, full of heart, humor, and perhaps even a bit of melancholy — an excellent entry into the canon of Pixar shorts. (Robert Bouffard)
My absolute favorite Pixar short is Piper. Setting aside the absolutely astounding animation (that almost feels like showing off at this point), it is the short that connects with me on so many levels. I was a beach kid growing up, and Piper’s experience of discovering the surf and the sand is so familiar to me. It brings me a wave of nostalgic emotion. It also connects with me on another level: as a parent. Piper is about letting your children learn to be independent and preparing them for the world. Plus, that little sand crab is totes adorbs! (Nick Ferro)