10 Favorite Pixar Movies

Toys, Superheroers, Fish, and Monster Oh My!

Toy Story 3, Disney/Pixar

Over at the It’s the Pictures podcast, my cohost and I delved into some Disney magic joining Disney’s 100th celebration. We discussed some of our favorite movies from childhood, what we believe are the best movies overall, and some of our favorite songs from Disney’s vast catalog. The original purpose of the It’s the Pictures newsletter was to expand upon the podcast offering more in-depth coverage and analysis. With that in mind, I’m going to be sending out newsletters covering Disney for a little bit. These will include samples for free subscribers and the whole kit and caboodle for paying subs.

Remember Free Subscribers get a ton of free posts, but Paid Subscribers get special posts and fully unlocked archives featuring the best of the It’s the Pictures newsletter.

This list will include movies from Pixar. I have not seen Cars 2, Cars 3, or Elemtental so those aren’t eligible (although due to critical consensus, I doubt they’d be in contention). Elemental opened over the weekend to some of the worst critical and commercial results Pixar has seen in its history. There’s already plenty of debate about why that might’ve happened (the pandemic conditioned audiences to wait for Pixar movies to come to Disney+, poor buzz out of the Cannes Film Festival, or a lack of success launching animated features without known IP.) Current CCO Pete Docter discussed some of that and more in a recent interview with Variety. While I think Pixar will recover from this setback in their 27th release, the docket for 2024 doesn’t look super promising either with the original movie Elio and the sequel Inside Out 2.

But enough with the bad news. I wanted to share some of my favorite Pixar movies and I hope that if you haven’t seen one of these you can add it to your queue on Disney+.

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10. Monsters, Inc.

Monsters, Inc. is all about the monsters that live in our closets or under our beds. One of the top scarers in the monster world, James P. Sullivan (John Goodman) is able to frighten humans like few others. His best friend, Mike Wazowski (Billy Crystal), isn’t so scary, but he’s a valuable friend and assistant. The collection of the screams of frightened humans is important to the monster world, but on one mission they end up befriending a little girl named Boo who follows them into this frightening world. Monsters, Inc. is successful not only for the 1-2 punch of Goodman and Crystal, but its concept is so ingenious.

9. Turning Red

One of the Pixar movies released during the pandemic, Turning Red seems like a movie that should have way more fans than it does. It’s my favorite movie Pixar has made since 2015. It stars 13-year-old Mei Lee (voiced by Rosalie Chiang), who is torn between being a perfect daughter and the excitement of growing up. She has her group of best friends, the boy band they absolutely love, and a unique problem — whenever her emotions get too overwhelming, she turns into a giant red panda. If you somehow missed this when it first launched on Disney+, give it a shot now, it’s a ton of fun.

8. Up

Look for Up on Youtube and the first thing you’ll find about the movie is its extremely emotional prologue. This ten-or-so-minute intro shows the life that Carl Fredricksen (Ed Asner) led and why that has made him into the grumpy old man that he is. He’s likely to spend the rest of his days in the house he’s spent most of his life in, but that all changes when adventure strikes, and he is joined by 8-year-old Russell on an incredible voyage. I agree that the first ten minutes of Up are incredible and worth turning on as a short film by itself, but if you turn it off there, you’ll be missing a fantastic animated feature that proves life isn’t over if you are ready for adventure.

7. The Incredibles

The Incredibles is one of the first great superhero movies. Some of the Christopher Reeves’ Superman movies were fine, I think X-Men had come out by then, but for my money, The Incredibles really showcased why Superhero movies would become the biggest box office giants over the next two decades. Imagine if you will, a good Fantastic Four movie! That’s what The Incredibles brought to the forefront. When it came time for The Incredibles 2 to finally be released, some had proclaimed The Incredibles was still one of the very best superhero movies despite all that came out after it.

6. Toy Story

The one that started it all for Pixar. Since I wasn’t alive for Snow White and the Seven Drawfs, I can’t really describe the sea change in the industry that happened due to its success. But audiences can currently see how much Toy Story changed things with almost every animated film being influenced by CGI. Toy Story was a lot of work and it was a monstrous risk, but somehow, Pixar pulled it off. The question at the heart of it all ended up being, what do your toys do when you aren’t there? Despite its now-aging technology, Toy Story still holds up as one of Pixar’s very best movies.

5. Ratatouille

Despite not being one of Pixar’s most profitable movies (can you imagine selling plush rats of the main characters?), Ratatouille remains one of the best because of its story. Remy (voiced by Patton Oswalt) dreams of eating fine cuisine and he wants to learn how to cook. The only problem is that he’s a rat. Hard enough to make food in a kitchen without trouble, never mind entering a fine dining establishment and working. I remember the first time I saw this and how good Pixar made the food look. Don’t watch this one while hungry.

4. Inside Out

Even though Inside Out came out almost a decade ago I still use the phrase “This is going to be a core memory.” The movie follows two of Riley’s emotions Joy (Amy Poehler) and Sadness (Phyllis Smith), who’ve found themselves lost. While the emotions are experiencing this dilemma as a problem they need to solve, Riley is going through big life changes that have created this problem. There’s been a big move to a new city, new friends, a new home, and even a change in what she likes. Inside Out is one of the truly original movies that have come out of Pixar, an absolute gem.

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