#132 Toy Story

Let's take a minute to appreciate the genius of the concept of this movie. It's in a world where toys come to life when you're not playing with them. They can walk and talk, they each have personalities, they feel pain and even love. Woody is the leader, and they have an organised political system, meetings and everything. And, moreover they actually like being played with, but never reveal to Andy that they can talk.

One of my favourite moments of this movie is right at the start when it is Andy's birthday and they are trying to figure out if there is going to be any new toys to join their group. On Woody's orders, the army toys set up a walkie talkie and hide it in a plant pot. The system is organised and intelligent. Not something people usually think of when toy story is mentioned.

This is perhaps the only movie on this list that I have watched as a child and I appreciate it now as much as I did then. Perhaps even more so, since now there is an element of reminiscence as well. It was fun to re-appreciate some of the best moments, including Woody's "You are a toy" speech, "The Claw", and of course the best moment - when the toy's are trying to scare Sid, and Woody starts exclaiming that they don't like being hurt and he finishes it by saying: "So play nice".

Speaking of which, from this we gather that it actually is possible for them to talk and move while humans are watching, so why then do they not? Perhaps its some kind of "Toy Code" or "Toy Law" where for the sake of mankind, they think its best kept a secret. But why then does Buzz, not believing that he is a toy, still feel the need to stop when Andy approaches? I assume its some kind of Toy instinct, where even if they can't seem to think of a decent reason, they naturally stop moving whenever a human comes near. I also feel that deep down Buzz knows that he's a toy, but that he's just denying it. This stuff isn't ever properly explained, but I guess it is a kids movie and you're not supposed to look into it in too much depth. And I never really did, until now.

So every movie has a "bad guy" character and in the case of this one it wasn't one of the toys. All of the toys in the movie, including the mutilated ones, were good. Sure, they all had elements of immoral behaviour and disagreement but there wasn't an evil toy. The evil character was in fact Sid, one of the humans. He is portrayed as evil, as he would be in the eye of the toys, but in truth he's just a harmless boy who assumes, like most of us, that toys are inanimate and takes pleasure cutting them up and putting them back together again. Heck, the kid probably grows up to be an engineer.

Anyway, this movie is a definite classic. I think its a great concept, cleverly applied. It's the sort of movie they show around christmas every year, and so I'm sure I'll be watching it again soon.