INSIDE OUT Is a New Pixar Classic

INSIDE OUT Review:

- To distill complex ideas and concepts into easily-palatable art that can be enjoyed and appreciated by all ages is no easy feat. And yet, with INSIDE OUT, the geniuses at Pixar do just that. They create a film so thematically rich and resonant that I have to say - it left me somewhat floored. This isn't the first film or TV show to look inside someone's head and anthropomorphize emotions. We've seen it in works from the old sitcom Herman's Head to Epcot Center's defunct ride Cranium Command. But never has a look inside a person's head been realized - visually or thematically - with this much thoughtfulness and artistry. INSIDE OUT is not just the best Pixar movie in years, it's right up there in the top two or three films that the storied studio has ever produced.

INSIDE OUT takes us inside the mind of young Riley, a girl who's been uprooted from her life in the Midwest to hilly, hippy San Francisco. The trauma of the move, combined with all of the normal preteen anxieties and awkwardness, means that a lot is going on inside Riley's head. And the film shows us how all of that plays out by going all in - showing us the inner workings of Riley's mind via personifications of Joy, Sadness, Fear, Anger, and Disgust.

The movie brilliantly conveys how these core emotions develop from infancy and through childhood, to the point where, in the preteen years, they once again begin to evolve and change. Watching the film from an adult perspective, there's an undeniable sense of nostalgia-tinged sense of loss in seeing Riley slowly stray from childhood innocence into pre-adult hyper-awareness of reality. Wonderment and imagination is supplanted by stress, social anxiety, familial frustration, and all-too-acute self-awareness. The effect is like watching a band make intricately composed music out of a few basic notes. It helps that the emotion-characters are so amazingly realized. Their designs are perfect - totally embodying - simply yet effectively - what each represents. And the voice-acting is similarly fantastic. Amy Poehler is award-worthy as Joy - spunky, caring, determined. But what's really interesting here is the interplay between Joy and Sadness. Sadness, voiced in a memorable and at times heartbreaking performance by The Office's Phylis Smith, is perhaps the film's most stand-out character. In part because Smith makes her both painfully reflective of the way in which we actually feel sadness, but also because the movie emphasizes just how important Sadness is in order for a person to experience Joy. The two characters are companions in the movie, just as the two emotions are intertwined in Riley's brain. It's a powerful idea that's at once both simple and incredibly layered - that in order to be well-rounded, empathetic people - we need to be able to experience and understand sadness.

There's a deep sense of nostalgia for childhood innocence in the film - it will likely have you thinking back to formative moments of your childhood in a way you likely haven't in a long while. But INSIDE OUT is also an incredibly fun and funny film. Louis Black was a standout to me as Anger. As with the other emotions, Anger seems to perfectly embody the way in which our own rage-meters actually get triggered. But man, Black is also hilarious in the role, serving as a red-hot rage-machine counterpoint to the sullen Sadness and peppy joy. Meanwhile, Mindy Kaling's snarky Disgust and Bill Hader's neurotic Fear round out the movie's comedic trio. When Joy and Sadness leave Riley's control center on a mission to prevent catastrophe, the scenes of Disgust, Fear, and Anger left to haplessly hold down the fort are consistently off-the-charts funny and entertaining.

What's also interesting is that, even though we get such a complex look at what's happening inside Riley's head, that fact never really undermines how great of a character Riley herself actually is. Riley could easily have felt like a walking puppet whose strings are being pulled. But instead, she feels fully-drawn and someone that we really, really root for. We just want her to turn out okay, and we cringe whenever Anger or Sadness or Disgust takes over and seems to derail her from being happy and her best self. Similarly, we can't help but feel a sense of loss as we see her growing up at the expense of childhood flights-of-fancy, like her almost-entirely-forgotten imaginary friend Bing-Bong (voiced amusingly by the always-great Richard Kind). But again, what's great is that while Riley's emotions are universal, she herself is still a very specific character. That means that the movie can have some real fun when it shows us fleeting flashes of other people's heads. The results are often really funny, but it's also sort of poignant to see how we can all be so different and yet so uncannily alike. This is a film that espouses empathy, and it does so in a deceptively smart and nuanced way.

INSIDE OUT would be an impressive film just by virtue of how spot-on it is in its representation of our memories, thoughts, and emotions. From the way our unconscious mind creates dreams and nightmares, to the way that an earworm ad jingle can get lodged in our brains, INSIDE OUT feels dead-on with its incredibly well-thought-out depiction of the human mind. Visually, Riley's mindscape is gorgeously rendered, with every aspect seemingly thought through to the last detail. At the same time, we never care about Joy and the rest of the emotions at the expense of Riley.

I could rave about INSIDE OUT for many more paragraphs, but I'll just compliment by saying that the film itself works in the same way as Riley's emotions do. This is a film that goes to some surprisingly dark and somber places, but in doing so it rewards us with true joy and heartfelt emotional connection. It's Exhibit A of what separates Pixar's best from the rest of the animation pack - they don't take shortcuts to get us emotionally involved in their stories - they don't hold back or pull punches, and that makes the payoff that much more meaningful. INSIDE OUT is a movie that will tug on the heartstrings of even jaded adults. But more importantly, there is an important and brilliantly-realized message here about understanding ourselves, and in doing so understanding and empathizing with others.

My Grade: A

Bye-Bye to PARKS AND REC: The Last Great TV Comedy

PARKS AND RECREATION - Goodbye to the Last Great TV Comedy

- With tonight's series finale of Parks and Recreation, it truly is the end of an era. Parks is the last of its breed - the last broadcast network sitcom that tried to bring edgy, Millennial-friendly comedy to the mainstream. Parks is perhaps the most beloved low-rated sitcom ever - in the grand tradition of The Office, 30 Rock, and Community - all NBC shows that had increasingly small on-air audiences, even if their actual fanbases were much larger. Sure, there are some spiritual successors to Parks out there in TV land. Brooklyn Nine-Nine is the most obvious - it is, after all, from Parks and Rec's Michael Schur (along with Dan Goor). And that show has found solid ratings success on Sunday nights. The Goldbergs on ABC is another potential successor - a family sitcom that combines very traditional sitcom tropes with a surreal and subversive, pop-culture-obsessed streak. But mostly, the best comedy these days is on cable, where it is increasingly able to get weird and niche-y. I love the likes of Broad City, Nathan For You, and Garfunkel and Oates. But those shows are going for very specific audiences. In theory, Parks should have been the biggest comedy of the last ten years. It was jam-packed with a great cast of diverse characters, and had a ton of heart. Parks' humor was razor-sharp, but it was also unabashedly earnest and sweet. It wasn't about off-putting well-off LA one-percenters (hello, Modern Family). It was about hard-working small-town Americans. And in an age of political divisiveness and gridlock, Parks and Rec was a constant reminder of our potential to put aside our differences and work together towards a common goal. Like I said, the fact that this *wasn't* the #1-rated comedy on TV speaks to the reality that no comedy is mainstream anymore. With most shows, I get it. But Parks was so funny, so good, so heartfelt, so universal in its themes that you have to wonder if, upon its end, we'll ever see the likes of it again.

Parks and Rec didn't start out amazing. In a strangely similar fashion as its predecessor, The Office, Parks' first season got out of the gate wobbly. Amy Poehler's Leslie Knope was, well, sort of annoying. And the focus on her undermined the stellar supporting cast. But like The Office, Parks came into its own in Season 2. The show became more of an ensemble comedy, and what an ensemble it was. If the show were launching today, it would have the all-star cast of all-star casts. Amy Poehler, Nick Offerman, Chris Pratt, Aubrey Plaza, Rob Lowe, Rashida Jones, Aziz Ansari, Retta, Adam Scott ... and the list goes on.

I heard someone say that the characters on Parks were so perfect because it was as if each represented a certain part of our personality. We all have aspects of these characters inside of us. Leslie is the ambitious go-getter. Ron Swanson the stubborn iconoclast. Andy the big kid. April the sarcastic teenager. Ben the nerd, Tom the would-be player. Jerry/Larry/Gary the loser-dork. There's that, but what makes Parks' characters so fantastic is that, at the same time, none could be reduced to one-note cliches. Leslie was a go-getter, but also a devoted friend who put her BFF Anne above all else. Ron Swanson was a stoic man's man, but he also moonlighted (hilariously) as local jazz legend Duke Silver, and had a kryptonite-like weakness for his ex-wife Tammy. Andy and April seemed polar opposites, but both found joy in each other and became a delightfully oddball couple. Tom, it turned out, was a romantic at heart. Hell, even Jerry was revealed to have an insanely idyllic home life that completely contrasted with his sad-sack reputation in the workplace. Parks never shied away from contradictions and complexity - and showing how and why these characters worked so well together despite their differences.

My favorite example - the one that to me is the heart and soul of the show - is the relationship between Leslie and Ron. Vulture published an essay a few weeks ago about how Ron represented the last gasp of the old man's-man stereotype, how he was the last of a dying breed. I argued that the essay missed the point. What's so brilliant about the Ron Swanson character is that he has his very strong likes and dislikes - he's got a freaking "Pyramid of Success" - but he also was never beholden to outdated views if those views were ugly or mean-spirited. Sure, Ron Swanson doesn't like Europe or skim milk. But he also is a man who sort of transcends specific politics. He likes what he likes. But not because of any ulterior motive or agenda. And that means that when push comes to shove, he admires Leslie's drive and fire and friendship. It's why the "Ron and Leslie" episode in Parks' final season, in which the feuding pair is locked in a room together and forced to hash out their problems - is such a legitimate tearjerker. The show brilliantly led us to believe that the rift that had formed between Ron and Leslie during the two-year gap between Seasons 6 and 7 was about clashing politics. But the real reason behind it was heartbreakingly revealed to be Ron's feeling that his unlikely friend Leslie - wrapped up in her new job - had left him behind.

But even when Parks does have its characters disagree on politics, the disagreements have a purity to them that is inspiring. Ron and Leslie often have different philosophies on government - but again, those views come from a pure place. The political fights on Parks would often see Leslie and Ron united - because it wasn't about Democrat vs. Republican vs. Libertarian - Leslie's battles were about smarts vs. stupidity, integrity vs. shiftiness and hucksterism, community vs. homogenization, and sticking up for friends and family. It's no wonder then that Leslie and Ron were ultimately on the same side when push came to shove.

Aside from all that, from a sheer comedy perspective, Parks is a bar-setter. I don't know all of the behind-the-scenes people who made the show as sharp as it was. But what's amazing is how, over the years, I've discovered new comedy voices who were associated with the show. Sure, going in, comedy fans knew creators Greg Daniel and Michael Schur's bonafides. And we knew Amy Poehler from years on SNL and Aziz Ansari from his stand-up. But aside even from the breakout cast members like Aubrey Plaza and Chris Pratt, we've seen people like Megan Amram, a writer on the show, become a cult comedy favorite. And tragically, one of the show's Co-EP's - Harris Wittels - a guy who was by all accounts the show's go-to joke puncher-upper, and an emerging stand-up comedian and comedy writer - passed away last week. One only needs to look at Wittels' Twitter to see what an incredibly hilarious voice was lost. But his ability to nail jokes and joke construction - and just the overall talent of the writing staff - was evident on any given episode of Parks. Amazingly, the show is going out sharper than ever. This final season has been a veritable comedy master-class. Each episode is jam-packed with instant-classic quotes and perfectly-constructed jokes. The comedy has been able to swing from character humor to parody (as in the impressively unique Johnny Karate episode from last week), from pop-culture references to absurdism. And yet ... I (and suspect many of you) have been left misty-eyed by nearly every episode this season. To be that funny and that emotionally-involving is a rare feat for any show to pull off.

And that's why I say Parks and Rec might just be the last great comedy. There's something to be said for comedy that doesn't have to swing for the fences, that can just be what it wants to be and get as weird as it wants to. I love that stuff. But there's also something to be said for comedy that can be funny and smart and challenging, but also have the characters and heart and real-world relatability to ensure that there's something there for everyone. It's hard for me to imagine *anyone* giving Parks and Rec a try and not digging it. But increasingly, the Parks-esque shows are disappearing from the air. They're becoming watered down like Modern Family. Or going to Netflix (Tina Fey's upcoming Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt) or the web (Community's upcoming sixth season). And as that happens, comedy won't need to appeal to a broad audience anymore. There's a part of that that's cool, sure. But there's also something sad about the end of shows that unite us in laughter, just as the characters on Parks were united around their beloved town of Pawnee. That sense of community is evaporating - we're all separating off into our little tribes where our super-specific tastes are catered to with web series and podcasts. And in that environment, you have to wonder if any show will again be able to be a true national-conversation starter again. Parks was never that show, but it was to a lot of the people that mattered. People who were smart and funny liked Parks. Parks people were my people. And it was watched by the funniest comedians and most important politicians (everyone from the Obamas to Joe Biden to John McCain - who cameo'd multiple times - were fans). The ending of Parks and Recreation makes me sad - it's the end of a great TV show, but also sort of the end of an era for TV. But as long as the spirit of Leslie Knope lives on, as long as Ron Swanson's Pyramid of Greatness hangs on college dorms and office cubicles, as long as we still reference DJ Roomba and Burt Macklin: FBI and JJ's Diner and the Cones of Dunshire and Jean Ralphio and Perd Hapley, then Parks and Rec will *literally* live on forever in Lil' Sebastian-esque fashion.

So long Parks and Rec. It's been an amazing, legendary run.

THEY CAME TOGETHER Is A Wet, Hot, Hilarious Comedy Classic

 THEY CAME TOGETHER Review:

- Funny is funny, and good lord, THEY CAME TOGETHER is flippin' funny. Sure, comedy might be subjective, but for me, the comedic stylings of David Wain, Michael Showalter, and the rest of the crew from 90's comedy troupe The State hit the sweet spot. And if that sort of comedy floats your boat, then it's time to rejoice, for They Came Together is exactly what the doctor ordered.

Back in the day, The State was one of my holy pillars of comedy, alongside things like The Simpsons, Ren & Stimpy, Conan O'Brien, Weird Al, and the films of Mel Brooks. The State helped mold my taste in humor, and helped fuel my love for out-there, absurdist comedy. The group then went on to have perhaps its greatest moment with the David Wain-directed, Wain and Showalter-written cult classic Wet Hot American Summer. Wet Hot is always hard to talk about, because people always want to assign *reasons* why great comedies work as well as they do. Wet Hot isn't a classic because it's a pitch-perfect parody, or because of any sort of message it has or anything like that. Nope, the movie is just funny as hell, and completely encapsulates and exemplifies everything that makes The State's brand of absurdist humor so hilarious. The writing is so smart and sharp - and the lines delivered so well by the talented actors - that the movie will be quoted and referenced from now until forever. Since Wet Hot, a bunch of members of The State collaborated on the movie The Ten, and Wain, Showalter, and Michael Ian Black starred in the short-lived Comedy Central series Stella (and then the latter two re-teamed for the equally short-lived Michael and Michael Have Issues). Wain has also gone on to direct two very funny, but slightly more mainstream-friendly films in Role Models and Wanderlust, in addition to his web series - Wainy Days - which he also starred in. Showalter released a pretty-good indie comedy called The Baxter. And Wain and others have been involved in the fantastic Adult Swim series Children's Hospital, which is very much in line with the style of humor that made The State such an influential sketch comedy show.

There's your short history lesson. But the context is important so that I can make the following point: THEY CAME TOGETHER is the best movie anyone from The State's been involved with since Wet Hot American Summer, and if you're a fan of The State, Stella, or Wet Hot, you seriously need to drop whatever thing you're doing at this very moment and go watch this film.

Here's the thing: THEY CAME TOGETHER is a much more overt parody movie than Wet Hot. It's a satire of romantic comedies, in particular the sort of formulaic, cutesy, schmaltzy moves that just kept coming down the Hollywood assembly line in the 90's and early 00's. There's less of 'em now (thank god), but the tropes are now so embedded in our collective pop-cultural consciousness that we all know the conventions inside and out. So yes, on one level, there will be people who enjoy the film primarily because of how sharply and cleverly it skews rom-coms. Not just in a broad sense, but on a micro-level. Wain and Showalter love micro-analyzing all the weird little nuances that we sort of accept as being part of a given genre. The stock characters, the way people talk, the plot devices that show up over and over again until they become, essentially, self-parodying cliches. They take what's already absurd about the genre and then crank up the absurdity to eleven. At the same time, as someone who's not really a fan of 90's-style rom-coms, and who would not normally be all that intrigued by a straight-up genre parody, I can vouch that THEY CAME TOGETHER is not a simple genre parody. Like Wet Hot, this is, more than anything, a movie that exists so that Wain and Showalter can have a forum for their weird wordplay jokes, wacky sight gags, and calculatedly hilarious randomness. So please, hold the phone, all you critics who talk about this film like it's the rom-com version of Scary Movie. No. Not even close. Yes, the premise of the film is based on genre-parody, and many jokes and characters are in direct reference to rom-com convention. But that, my friends, is only part of what the movie is all about.

In any case, let's back up for a minute and talk about the film's plot and structure. The movie opens on a dinner between two couples. One - Joel (Paul Rudd) and Molly (Amy Poehler) - tells the other couple (played by Bill Hader and Ellie Kemper), the tale of how they met and fell in love. This serves as the movie's framing device, and on multiple occasions we cut back to the two couples for various interjections and digressions. The first four names I mentioned already give you a solid idea of just how fantastic the cast is. For one thing, Rudd and Poehler - both alumni of Wet Hot - are perfect in their respective roles. They both totally get the tone that Wain and Showalter are going for. Rudd in particular has become a master of doing the sort of mock-sincere comedic acting that this sort of movie calls for. And Poehler is similarly excellent. Meanwhile, their characters' backstory is a great little extended riff on typical rom-com types. Rudd's Joel works for a giant, soulless candy conglomerate looking to shut down its mom-and-pop competition. Poehler's Molly owns a small little candy shop where all profits inexplicably get donated to charity. So of course, they hate each other at first, even if it's all too clear that they're fated to fall for one another ... eventually.

There are so many great moments in this film - I was pretty much laughing constantly for the duration. Some of the funniest stuff in the movie comes from the interaction between Rudd and New Girl's Max Greenfield, as his freeloading little brother. Their melodramatic conversations are instant classics. Rudd also has great scenes with his group of supportive buddies, who he meets for basketball games that mix hilariously awful basketball playing with the espousing of various nuggets of wisdom and life lessons. Ken Marino is (as always) a standout as Rudd's brash, mulleted b-ball buddy. But Jack McBrayer and Keenan Thompson are no slouches. Michael Ian Black is also a scene-stealer as Rudd's asshole work rival. Nobody does smug d-bag like Black, and he cranks up the douchery to new levels here, to hilarious effect. Actually, the candy conglomerate where Rudd works is filled with funny folks. Micaela Watkins and Jason Mantzoukas pop up as co-workers, and then, Christopher Meloni ... Dude. How is a guy whose stock-and-trade is playing stern hardasses also this freaking funny? Meloni became a cult comedy icon in Wet Hot, and he's breathlessly funny here as Rudd's grandiose boss. I can't even talk about the character without spoiling a bunch of great jokes. Suffice it to say, the guy just owns it once again. Who else? Ed Helms is funny as a sad-sack suitor of Molly's, Zandy Hartig is excellent as Molly's glum sister, and Wain himself makes a great cameo that is too weird to even explain in writing. Speaking of cameos, the movie is jam-packed with them. I don't want to spoil anything, because some of the actors who pop up are just so wonderfully random and unexpected. I'll just say: there's a random "making-of-the-film" segment, *within* the film (shades of Children's Hospital) which features some great appearances. And then, towards the end of the movie, a very respected actor makes a totally insane appearance that is just weird, random, and awesome.

For the rom-com fans (or rom-com haters), there are tons of references - both broad and specific - to various films in the genre. Everyone from Woody Allen to Nora Ephron gets skewered, and I've already seen articles on Vulture and other websites that list out all the little nods to various genre staples. A lot of the parody isn't even specific to rom-coms though. Like I said, Wain and Showalter love to microanalyze the weird ways that characters talk and act in movies in general. And anyone who's followed their work will see the kinds of trademark jokes that have popped up in things like Stella and Wet Hot reappear. So yes, you can bet that there will be at least one random make-out sesh where one character dramatically whispers to the other something like "what are we doing ...?", and at least one diatribe that includes an absurdly long list of rhetorical questions. There will be random gross-out gags and at least one big, romantic profession of love that falls hilariously flat. In short, all the sorts of jokes that these guys deliver so well are here, and man, as a devotee of The State and all that came after, I couldn't be happier.

There's just a great feeling that comes with seeing the best in the biz do what they do best. I grew up on The State's humor, and because we only rarely get new material from the State/Stella crew working in tandem, THEY CAME TOGETHER couldn't be more welcome or more needed. In a world dominated by Apatowian improv-comedy, dramedy that is less about laughs and more about social satire, etc., it's infinitely reassuring to know that Wain and co. are (almost singlehandedly) carrying the torch for this sort of balls-to-the-wall, anything-goes humor. This is no mere nostalgia act though. The laughs I got from this movie were genuine, and they were big. As many great comedies as we've already seen this year, the laughs produced by They Came Together were the only laughs I had that were of the truly uncontrollable, deep-belly-laugh variety. This is the comedy that made me want to urge every friend I have to go see it so that we can immediately start quoting and referencing it. This is the comedy where friends who *did* see it are already incorporating its best quotes into everyday conversation. This is the stuff of comedy legend, people. I don't know if this is quite in the same hallowed league as Wet Hot. It doesn't provide quite the same concentrated burst of nonstop comedy perfection. But it's close. Very close. And I can only hope that Wain and Showalter keep making these movies and doing their thing. Because this is my comedy sweet spot, and nobody does it better.

My Grade: A