Inside Out (4 Stars)

Wow! Is it really eight years since I saw "Inside Out" in the cinema? I still remember it so clearly.

It's a children's film that isn't a children's film. What I mean is that it's packaged as a children's film with funny cartoon characters, but the film's psychological implications are too deep for a small child to understand it.

The film's premise is that everyone is governed by five personality traits: Joy, Sadness, Fear, Anger and Disgust. They work as a committee, governing the actions of a person and archiving the memories. The most important memories are promoted to core memories that become the person's underlying characteristics. The five personality traits are portrayed as five cartoon characters with the same gender as the person they rule over. The head of the committee varies from person to person. In the case of 11-year-old Riley, her ruling trait is Joy.

Riley had a happy life growing up in Minnesota. Her parents loved her, she had good friends, she was successful at ice hockey, and she lived in an idyllic environment. Then her family moved to San Francisco, into an ugly little house. She no longer had her friends by her side, and her father became agitated by the pressure of his new job. Sadness begins to take over inside her head, but Joy fights to retain control.

It's a complex story, and I won't tell you what happens, but I'll give you the resolution: Riley can't settle down in San Francisco until Joy accepts that Sadness has a part to play in her life.

The repercussions are mind-blowing. The film has an age certificate of 0 years. That only means that there's nothing in the film that's harmful to young children. But what age is the film suitable for? I mean, how old do children have to be to understand it? Thinking of myself, I would probably have understood it when I was 12, but I was advanced for my age. Other 12-year-olds might pick out things that they like while not understanding the overall themes. Come to think of it, many adults might not understand the film's psychological implications.

Despite being a comedy, the film was written with the assistance of two leading psychologists. It was important for the interplay of the base personality traits in the mind to be portrayed accurately. The hard work put into making the film has resulted in an outstanding work of art. In 2016 it received the Oscar for the Best Animated Film at the Academy Awards.

Success Rate:  + 2.9

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