MovieCritic]
Hi everybody! This is Thunderbird Queen, from The Winchester North Star. Movies Meet Their Match has graciously let me be a guest for their Pixar Blogathon, so a big thank you to her! Today, I want to give you readers a breakdown of why A Bug’s Life is one of Pixar’s best films, as I don’t think it gets enough attention.
If you haven’t seen the movie, there are spoilers ahead.
Synopsis: An inventive ant named Flik is always causing problems for his colony. After his latest mistake causes problems with a group of grasshoppers and their leader, Hopper, Flik seeks help elsewhere. A miscommunication leads him to hiring a circus troop of insects instead of warriors.
Characters:
The first thing I want to touch on is the characters. A Bug’s Life can be pushed into the category of Pixar films made in the late 90’s and early 2000’s. While other movies of that era had two or three main characters at a time (Toy Story, Monsters Inc., etc.), Bug’s Life has a dozen main characters. In fact, that was part of what the production team wanted. They wanted to create every character with their own personalities, stories, and motives, instead of lumping them into a group. With the circus insects, this would have been very easy to do. However, this isn’t the case. The entire sequence that shows the circus bugs, and their subsequent firing from the business, is completely dedicated to identifying them as individuals. The rest of the cast, Flik, Atta, Hopper, are given a little more insight and work, but for good reason.
The villain is a grasshopper named Hopper, who is scarred and blind in one eye. He’s clever, charismatic, and willing to kill to achieve his goals, even his own subordinates. His entire gang flies in a formation like World War 11 bomber planes, for crying out loud! A wonderful touch on the production team for that one. Not to mention the fact that his demise featured his absolute worse fear: eaten alive by birds.
Theme:
This is probably the biggest point that sets the movie apart from the rest of Pixar’s films. Overall, there are two themes. The first is learning to come into your own, given time. In one form or another, every character struggles with fitting in, or making a difference in their world. Eventually, they all find their proper place: Flik is accepted fully in his colony, Atta becomes a strong Queen, and Dot learns to fly. The seed analogy used can be used for any life situation.
“Pretend it’s a seed, OK?”- Dot
The second theme is the best and strongest. Simply put, it’s about banding together and overthrowing tyranny. Yes, this is legit. The ant colony in Bug’s Life is forced to collect an abundance of food for a gang of grasshoppers, led by the scarred leader Hopper. As we come to find out, the grasshoppers have absolutely no need for the food, but Hopper just refuses to relinquish is power hold. In the end, however, Flik realizes that the colony is far stronger, outnumbering the grasshoppers 100 to 1, exactly what Hopper feared. What follows is an uprising and a thought out plan on how to actually kill Hopper and stop him in his tracks.
“Those ants outnumber us 100 to 1. If they ever figure that out, there goes our way of life!”- Hopper
Story:
I’ll wrap this up with just a few thoughts on the overall story. What’s fantastic about both characters and theme is that it’s all relevant no matter your age. The plot is incredibly rich, and is able to have a few sub- plots, like the exploring of Flik and Atta’s relationship, without seeming too crowded. If none of that is enough, the bright colors, lovable moments, and uplifting sound track is enough to pull anyone in.
Ahhhh this is so cool! It's been a long time since I've seen A Bug's Life, and this makes me want to give it another go. (The grasshoppers flying in WWII fighter plane formation though. *heart eyes*)
ReplyDeleteI know a lot of people who don't like it or the animation, but as ThunderbirdQueen points out, there are awesome bits. I hope you like it when you try again! (Yes!!)
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