Disney(ish) reviews with the Unshaved Mouse: Planes
Well. That was anti-climactic.
I feel like a knight who’s been on a quest to slay a terrible dragon for a decade only to arrive at the top of the mountain and find the dragon’s around the size of a chicken and died several years ago from old age.
In the early days of this blog I built up Planes as a personal bete noir, a movie I would never, ever review because it represented the worst of crass, merchandise driven movie-making for both Disney in particular and animation in general.
Oh my. How innocent I was. How innocent we all were.
But after years of the absolute garbage I have had to sit through for you people (love you all) it is with a heavy heart that I must report that Planes is…fine?
I mean, it is aggressively mediocre, don’t get me wrong. But, given the state of Disney’s output at present, there’s something refreshing about a movie that manages to hit a solid C.
In fact, I would say it was one of the most safely boring movies I’ve seen all year were it not for the fact that it’s set in the Cars universe and therefore is, as all movies in that benighted franchise are, weird as fuck.
WHAT KIND OF LIFE DOES THIS POOR CREATURE HAVE?!
The movie begins with two Air Force jets flying over the ocean and talking about Dusty Crophopper, the greatest flyer known to man weird anthropomorphised vehicle, with the kind of gushing, on-the nose-dialogue that tells you this is just a dream Dusty’s having from, like, the very second you hear it.
Sure enough, Dusty’s boss Leadbottom wakes him from his reverie and tells him to get back to work. See, Dusty Crophopper is a crop-duster (his parents wanted to name him Trismegistus Carruthers but you now how set in their ways people are). But, would you believe this rural small-town boy stuck in a dead end job has dreams of something greater? Of course you would, but that’s because you are savvy media-literate folks who’ve seen one, maybe even two, films. Nothing wrong with formula, I guess, but I’m kinda surprised Disney didn’t just forget the planes and crank out a crossover with Star Wars about a plucky X-Wing who goes off to fight the Empire.
The scene where he had to kill his new best friend was surprisingly heart-rending.
So Dusty wants to be a racer even though he’s not built for that and it’s actually damaging him when he exceeds his recommended maximum speed, something that is pointed out to him by his friend Dottie who is one of the little forklift people from the first two movies.
We need to talk about the forklift people because, well, there’s literally nothing else of interest to talk about this movie other than the utterly bizarre world-building. What are you expecting here? The Unshaved Mouse’s Analysis of Planes through the lens of Radical Queery Theory? It’s fucking Planes. Of course I’m going to talk about about the weird forklift people.
Ask yourself, how many forklifts have you seen today? Probably one or less, right? Unless you work in a forklift adjacent profession? Pretty specialised piece of equipment?
Well in the world of Planes, the forklifts have fucking taken over. They’re everywhere. I think there was an invasion and the old car-led order was violently overthrown. Spouse of Mouse pointed out that all the forklift people seem to be a labour class. I pointed out that they also seem to be running the military and also all the cars and planes are basically beasts of burden in this world and we can’t agree on who’s oppressing who (bit like our marriage, if I’m honest). If there had been this many of them in the first movie it would have to have been called Forklifts (And there are also a few cars for some reason). I can only imagine it’s because the animators decided that forklifts have arms and are closer to human proportions so it slightly explains why these living vehicles created a world that is very obviously designed for the human body.
Anyway, the plot, such as it is. Dusty spends his days crop-dusting by day and training by night for the qualifiers for the Wings Around the Globe Rally with his friend Chug, who’s a fuel truck. Chug suggests that Dusty gets some pointers from Skipper Riley, an old warplane who’s a World War 2 veteran.
World War 2 happened in the Cars universe?
I…
I have so many questions.
What kind of car was Hitler?
Obvious, in retrospect.
But Skipper turns Dusty down cold and the young crop duster has to race in the qualifiers without his guidance.
Anyway, we’re right at the point of this checklist masquerading as a screenplay where we’re supposed to meet our cocky douchebag antagonist. This is Ripslinger.
And I’m not saying he’s an obvious rip-off of Chick Hicks from Cars. I don’t need to. The frickin’ Disney wiki did it for me.
Sayin’ the quiet part loud, eh wiki?
Fuck’s sake Disney, not even going to give him a different colour?
Dusty competes and gives it his all, but, wouldn’t ya know it? He just fails to make the cut and doesn’t qualify. Well, I guess the movie’s over. But what’s this? One of the other planes was disqualified for using illegal fuel, which means Dusty qualifies by default right before the second act. Good job, Scriptotron 3000.
BEEP BOOP. SCRIPT PROGRESS AT 30%
I kid, but you know what? There’s some solid writing here. There’s a nice scene where Dusty starts to realise just how dangerous a flight around the world will be for a crop-duster. Skipper shows up and tries to talk him out of the race but Dusty insists on going saying that he’s sick of flying around the same field and “flying thousands of miles and never going anywhere”.
Impressed by his moxie, Skipper agrees to train this rookie and discovers the reason why Dusty always flies so low to the ground; he’s a plane who’s scared of heights.
Regardless, Skipper works with Dusty to improve his speed as a low-flying aircraft. Dottie buffs his engine and also offer to remove his duster to reduce drag, something the movie makes very clear is the equivalent of Dusty losing “the boys”. That’s not a joke.
Dusty travels to New York and lands at JFK Airport…FUCKING WHAT? JFK EXISTED IN THE CARS UNIVERSE AND (PRESUMABLY) WAS ASSASSINATED WHICH LED TO IDLEWILD BEING RENAMED WHAT?!? HOW DID LEE HARVEY OSWALD HOLD A RIFLE?! HOW DID HE GET UP THE STAIRS TO THE BOOK DESPOSITORY?!
Sorry. He lands at JFK Airport and meets his designated comedy sidekick (a Mexican plane named El Chupacabra) his designated love interest (an Indian plane named Ishani) and a stuffy British plane voiced by John Cleese in full “just put the money on the dresser and have your way with me” mode. Hell, even the designated comedy sidekick gets a designated love interest as El Chupacabra falls for Rochelle, a French-Canadian plane. Sorry I mean Carolina. Wait, no, Heidi. I mean Azurra. Sakura?
So one of the weirdest parts of this movie…no, I can’t justify that. One of the top fifty weirdest things in this movie is the character of Rochelle who was re-coloured, re-named and re-nationalised for a whopping 11 different internationalised releases. So she’s Australian in the Australian release, Brazilian in the Brazilian one and so on. And they did this because…I have no goddamned clue. Maybe Disneytoons just had a dream that every nation would get to see themselves represented as an overly sexualised plane. I know that’s my dream.
“Imagine aaaaaaall the people…”
The race begins and Dusty’s inability to fly high soon has him trailing the other racers but he starts to win them over with his unassuming do-right nature. As the race proceeds through India, Ishani takes Dusty on a tour of the Taj Mahal.
It has flight towers to show that planes built it even though it was probably built by cars even thought it would make no sense for them to build it and this entire world is like a nightmare I can’t wake up from.
Dusty tells Ishani that he’s worried about going over the Himalayas because of his fear of heights and she advises him to follow the train tracks instead. During the race, he follows the tracks only to find them lead to a tunnel. Unable to give up and unable to fly over the mountain, he does the sensible thing and just flies through the tunnel.
This ends up putting him ahead of the other racers and now he’s in the lead. But Dusty realises that Ishani set him up to fail and confronts her. He notices she’s sporting a shiny new propellor of a kind that only Ripslinger’s team uses and puts two and two together.
As the race continues, Dusty becomes a hero to vehicles all over the world who don’t just want to do what they were built for BY WHO?!?! FUCKING EXPLAIN HOW THIS WORLD WORKS YOU PIECE OF…
Sorry, sorry.
Ripsligner decides that he’s not losing to no stinking crop-duster and has two of his lackies clip Dusty’s navigating attenae while they’re flying over the Pacific. Dusty gets lost and is rescued by the USS Dwight D. Flysenhower and the various forklifts and planes that infest him like parasites on the hide of a whale.
On the Flysenhower Dusty is shocked to learn that his mentor Skipper only ever flew one mission during the war. Feeling betrayed and desperate to get back in the race, he leaves the ship, gets caught in a storm and crashes in the Pacific Ocean.
Dusty gets salvaged and as he recovers Skipper arrives and tells him the truth about the only mission he ever flew.
So, you know Thomas the Tank Engine? Did you know Thomas the Tank Engine could get incredibly dark? Like, there’s one episode where a train escapes the mass-scrapping of steam engines in England and it’s pretty much played like the dude escaped a concentration camp? Well, Planes now gives us a scene where we see Skipper’s entire squadron getting massacred by Japanese gunboats. Living, sentient planes just falling out of the sky in flaming ruins. It’s brutal and shocking and…honestly the best scene in this entire franchise. Although, keep in mind, I do loathe this franchise and that might be colouring my opinion somewhat.
Ha ha! Yes! Die! Die!
Dusty and Skipper reconcile and all the other planes chip in to donate parts to fix Dusty like he’s the Six Million Dollar Man, including Ishani who gives Dusty the fancy propellor she got in exchange for betraying him.
Dusty re-enters the race and starts to gain ground on Ripslinger. And, as always, you can probably predict all of the story beats right down to the photo-finish but I’ll say this in the movie’s defence; it’s a racing movie with good racing. The animation is lovely and the aerobatics are exciting to look at and you do get a real sense of speed. I mean, it’s not coming anywhere near my favourite animated racing movie but there’s an enjoyable competence to it all. Ripslinger and his goons try to hobble Dusty one more time but Skipper arrives in the nick of time to help Dusty escape them. Ripslinger and Dusty race for the finish line, Dusty wins, Ripslinger crashes into some portable toilets (if you recall, Cars 2 established that these vehicles piss oil) and the movie ends with all our couples paired up and a lucrative new stream of merchandising opportunities opened up for Disney and its affiliates and shareholders.
Don’t you just love a happy ending?
***
Scoring
How butt ugly is the animation? Is it as ugly as a butt?: 12/20
Cars has never been the gold standard for Pixar animation but, fair’s fair, it’s still Pixar. Disneytoons, the animated sweatshop that produced so much janky, direct-to-video garbage in the nineties actually acquit themselves very admirably. Judging on the animation alone, you’d think Pixar made this film and very few animation studios outside of the top-tier could achieve that.
Are the main characters jerks? I bet they’re jerks: 07/20
Dane Cook isn’t bad. I actually think I like him a little better than Own Wilson as Lightning McQueen. Absolute generic nothing of a part, but there’s no point where I felt he was actively bad.
Bet the villain’s a real shitpile, character wise: 04/20
Ripslinger is an actual villain, unlike Chick who was mostly just a douche. Not at all a memorable or charismatic villain but…reviewing this movie feels like reviewing a components based on the individual components. It’s like: the keyboard is not missing any keys. It is satisfactory.
Oh what’s this? Supporting characters? Fuck you supporting characters!: 04/20
Here’s where the movie does start to be actively annoying. When it tries for comedic relief, you just want to press a pillow down on its face and put it out of its misery.
Man, fuck the music. I hope it dies: 09/20
You know what, there’s parts of the score that are clearly aping Kenny Loggin’s Danger Zone and I’ll give points for that.
FINAL SCORE: 36%
NEXT UPDATE: 14th December 2023.
NEXT TIME: Yeah, I get pretty raggedy around this time of year too.
