Inside Out ~ Review

Inside Out

Non Spoiler and Spoiler Review

Ever wondered what goes on inside your head? Come explore the possibilities in the new Pixar Movie Inside Out.

12 year old Riley’s parents move her from Minnesota to San Francisco, California. Riley does all she can to stay happy and look for the adventure and fun in the move.

Once they get to their new home things get interesting inside Riley’s head and we get an inside peek at what is going on.

This movie is suitable for all ages. The little ones will find the characters engaging and entertaining. This movie is a great way to get slightly older kids to talk about their feelings. Teens and Adults will find this movie just plain FUN. There are parts of the movie that left me crying.

I give this movie 2 wings way up!

SPOILER ALERT!!!!

STOP READING HERE IF YOU DON’T WANT SPOILERS

The movie starts out with little Riley being born. Her primary emotion, Joy shows up. Whenever Riley gets sad, mad, afraid, angry or disgusted Joy turns it around for her. In quick snapshots you see Riley go up to be a young lady of 12.

Riley and her family move from Minnesota to San Francisco, California. Riley is scared and sad because of the move. Once inside the new home she is disgusted because the house is not what she expected or wanted.

As Riley goes through the emotions of the move Joy sees her various emotions and turns them around. When she sees a dead mouse in the house Joy gets her to think of the adventure of checking out her new room. When Riley sees her room and does not like it Joy gets her to think about how it will look when she decorates it. Then Riley finds her stuff will not be available for days! The moving van with all their stuff is lost!

The first day at the new school goes no better than the first day in the new home. The teacher calls on her Sadness takes control making Riley cry making things worse in Joy’s perception. Sadness accidently touches a happy core memory of Riley’s and turns it sad. Joy gets frustrated and trying to keep Riley happy asks Sadness not to touch ANYTHING but Sadness just keeps touching things.

At one point Sadness touches the controls and starts to make Riley sad. Sadness and Joy get into a little bit of an argument. The two of them get sucked into Riley’s long term memory storage. Joy has all of Riley’s core memories, the memories that give Riley her personality. So Riley basically has no personality.

With Joy and Sadness gone all that is left in Riley’s control room are Fear, Disgust and Anger. The three emotions each try to take control of Riley. They attempt to sound like Joy and see if they can make Riley happy. Instead they make things worse.

At one point you get a look into mom and dad’s control centers. You see mom trying to figure out what is wrong with Riley and dad being clueless about it. Dad puts his foot down and gets harsh with Riley when Riley’s Anger takes control and gets mouthy with dad. This just makes things worse.

Riley drops of out hockey and cuts off friends. She lies to her parents and steals her mother’s credit card so she can run away and go back to Minnesota to build new happy memories. Her emotional control room is destroyed. Riley can no longer feel emotions. Nothing Anger, Fear or Disgust try to do gets through.

Meanwhile Joy realizes that she has been trying to keep Riley from being sad. She sees that during some of Riley’s main core memories that helped create Riley’s personality there was some Sadness that finally turned to Joy. Joy had been separated from Sadness and now she looks for her, trying to get her back to the Control Room.

Joy and Sadness finally make it back to Riley's control room. Joy turns the controls over to Sadness and encourages Sadness to reach out to Riley. Riley responds to Sadness and returns home to her parents. Riley finally tells her parents she knows they “need her to be happy” but right now she can’t. She expresses her sadness and because of that her parents reach out to her helping her heal.

I feel the entire point of this movie is to show us that all emotions are important and have their place. If we are always Joyful we miss out on having people reach out to help us. If we are always Sad we don’t see the Joy in life. Anger can keep us from communicating clearly and Fear can keep us both safe and keep us from trying new things. Disgust can also keep us from new experiences.