An Ode To Pixar

Pixar has created 23 feature films and 20 short films since its formal establishment 35 years ago, garnering a total of 1,025 award nominations and winning 485 of them. Even their worst-performing pictures made over $100 million at the box office, which is unusual for a company. Pixar has never failed to deliver with its films, inventing new techniques to elicit emotional responses from viewers and to teach life lessons and messages with each new release.

Visions of the Creative

“At Pixar, our objective is to produce great films with wonderful people,” says the company's mission statement. We're proud of our history of creative and technological brilliance, and we're constantly on the lookout for great individuals to add to our team and community. We feel it is critical for our studio to represent the variety of the society in which we live and the global viewers for which we produce films.”

This philosophy is reflected in every Pixar picture, not just in the plot, but also in the way the films are created. “Every tale envisioned by the Pixar team involves something that they don't know how to achieve, so they build the technology that was needed,” according to a TIME article. 3-D computer animation had never been done before, and that technique did not exist when Pixar's first feature-length picture was in creation.

The animators on the film developed the technology to be able to do this style, but they ran into some limitations (namely, the inability to animate humans), which led to the idea that gave birth to one of the most successful animated film franchises in history: animating toys and naming the film ‘Toy Story.' The filmmakers were able to employ simple designs that lend themselves nicely to inanimate items and bring them to life against a flat background, which is why Andy's bedroom became the key setting for the film and why human features are seldom seen in the beginning.

‘Toy Tale' was the highest-grossing picture at the box office for three weeks in a row following its premiere, and audiences didn't flock to it only to marvel at the technological marvels, but rather because the story was one that so many people could relate to. Who'd have guessed that a video about toys would be used to demonstrate that change can be beneficial and that everyone is unique? And not just once, but three times more?

Pixar has become famous with utilizing non-humans to make stories that explore humanity's fundamental questions. The films in the ‘Toy Story' franchise are about accepting change, being yourself, and carving your own path. 'Monsters Inc.' teaches us that laughing is the best medicine (or energy) and that you should never judge a book by its cover. A Bug's Life is a metaphor for colonialism, and it resembles the American Revolution in a more kid-friendly fashion. The films "Finding Nemo" and "Finding Dory" emphasize the importance of family and the need of constantly returning to them. The idea of tenacity and never giving up is emphasized in the film ‘Ratatouille.' ‘WALL-E' is a cautionary tale about what can happen to our world if we do not care for it. Both ‘Inside Out' and ‘Soul' explore the human mind and what it means to feel and live.

Although these Pixar films are not primarily about people, they do portray some of the most honest stories about humankind. Using non-traditional characters allows these stories to serve as metaphors and allegories for larger ideas that are more digestible for young audiences and make the messages more poignant for older audiences, which is a big reason why Pixar is still one of the most profitable studios after 35 years.

Pixar's Cornerstone Individuals

Pixar directors usually come up with the concepts for their films and work on the manuscripts, resulting in these imaginative and distinctive visions being delivered to the big screen. John Lasseter, the former CEO of Pixar and one of its original filmmakers, directed five Pixar films (‘Toy Story', ‘A Bug's Life', ‘Toy Story 2', ‘Cars', ‘Cars 2', ‘Toy Story 3', ‘Planes', and ‘Toy Story 4') and assisted in the story development for eight films (‘Toy Story', ‘A Bug's Life', ‘Toy Story 2', ‘Car

“The story is the most essential thing,” Lasseter remarked in an interview with the Walt Disney Company when asked about his major criterion for what makes a Pixar picture a Pixar picture. You want it to have a strong emotional connection with the audience... You want people to be moved by the films... Make them humorous, beautiful, and terrifying, but at the end of the day, you want the movie's heart to be so strong.”

Pete Docter, Pixar's current CCO, has worked on practically every single Pixar feature film, in addition to directing four feature films ('Monsters Inc.,' 'Up,' 'Inside Out,' and 'Soul,') and writing seven screenplays ('Toy Story,' Toy Story 2', 'Monsters Inc.,' WALL-E, 'Up,' 'Inside Out,' and 'Soul, “In the past, we had a tremendous run of sequels, too many in a row,” he told The Hollywood Reporter about his vision for Pixar and its storylines moving ahead. We now have a lot of original content, which I'm happy about, but we definitely should have a couple more sequels in there for financial reasons. It may be difficult at times since creative ventures take on a life of their own and either take off or fail.”

Ed Catmull, the current president of Walt Disney Animation Studios, was a co-founder of Pixar and has been with the company since its beginning. Catmull explains why he feels Pixar has been successful in an op-ed for Harvard Business Review: “I feel we are responsible because we follow a set of principles and methods for managing creative talent and risk. Pixar is, in the truest meaning of the word, a community. We believe that long-term connections are important, and we share certain fundamental beliefs: talent is scarce. The purpose of management is to establish the ability to recover from failures, not to prevent them. Telling the truth must be risk-free. We must continually question all of our assumptions and look for weaknesses that might lead to the demise of our culture.”

“People prefer to conceive of innovation as a mysterious solo act, and they often restrict goods to a single idea: This is a film about toys, dinosaurs, or love, they'll say,” he explains. However, in filmmaking and many other types of complicated product creation, creativity necessitates the collaboration of a huge number of individuals from other disciplines in order to address a huge number of challenges... There are literally tens of thousands of concepts in a film. They're in every sentence's structure; every line's delivery; the design of people, settings, and backdrops; the camera's positioning; the colors, lighting, and tempo. A production's director and other creative leaders do not come up with all of the ideas on their own; rather, every single member of the 200- to 250-person production team contributes ideas. Creativity must be present at all levels of the organization, including the aesthetic and technical aspects.”

Their Achievements

Pixar's films have always been a box office, audience, and critical success, with their lowest-earning picture still generating $135.7 million at the international box office and all but one Pixar picture receiving a fresh Rotten Tomatoes rating. This popularity among the general public has translated into amazing award success for their films. They have garnered 15 Academy Award nominations for their short films, winning five of them. They have garnered 53 Academy Award nominations for their feature films (including two Best Picture nominations) and have won 18 of them, including 11 for Best Animated Feature Film. Only four Pixar feature films have been overlooked for Oscar nominations, which is a remarkable accomplishment for any company.

Pixar films have a strong following and are among the highest-grossing films of all time. They've become a magnet for prestigious prizes and a lighthouse for life lessons and emotional outlets for audiences of all ages. They've got three new feature films coming out in the next couple of years, so they've got an opportunity to keep their winning run continuing.

Let's hope for many more Pixar films (and many more emotional lessons and tears) in the future!

A version of this article was published by Hollywood Insider.