This was a lot of fun, and I didn't expect it to be, which just made it that much better. Disney has been pushing this film for so long, and telling us absolutely nothing about it, that it was saturating the market. It turns out I shouldn't have worried, because John Lassitar was at the helm and he has saved Disney from itself by backing fabulous stories like he did when he headed Pixar.
Big Hero 6, based on the Marvel comic (another Disney property. Ironic, isn't it?) takes place in the not-so-distant future in the city of San Fransokyo. The main character is Hiro, a young robotics genius who is a bit of a layabout until his older brother,Tadashi, convinces him to enter a robotics contest for a scholarship to the school he goes to. Hiro enters with a groundbreaking robotics design and wins. But there is a fire in the building and Tadashi ends up perishing in an explosion. Hiro is understandably heartbroken by this and one day accidentally turns on Baymax, Tadashi's invention of a robotic nurse that looks like a big balloon. Hiro realizes that someone has stolen his invention and is using it for nefarious ends, so he convinces Tadashi's friends to form a super team based on their individual scientific talents to stop the bad guy. They, with an upgraded Baymax, then go to save the day. Like many very original stories, there is obviously a lot more to this story, but I don't want to give too much away.
In a recent interview in Wired! magazine, John Lassitar gives his maxim for a great movie, whether it be live or animated: no matter how good the premise is, the characters must be believable and relatable for the movie to resonate with audiences. This is a basic truth with good storytelling anytime; that because we are seeing it unfold through his eyes, the protagonist is our anchor to the events of the story and helps us suspend disbelief for it by making him or her relatable. In other words, we like the main character, we tend to buy the story no matter how weird it is. This is especially crucial in sci-fi and fantasy, two genres whose odd environments require this suspension.
John Lassiter is responsible for pretty much every successful Pixar movie until he started to work as the head of Disney's animation department. Once he started at Disney with the movie Bolt, there is a dramatic uptick in the quality of Disney films that have been lacking since Mulan, when Jeffrey Katzenberg left. It is ironic that Disney did not learn from Katzenberg's example of what makes stories work, and has taken Lassitar to reteach these lessons to them. In both cases, Disney was the pioneer in animation, but that animation just became the money machine, with the dollar taking precedence over the story, and in each case, they could not produce an interesting or entertaining movie. Compare Oliver & Company to The Little Mermaid or Treasure Planet or Lilo & Stitch to Frozen. It is night and day.
Big Hero 6 has a lot of great themes running through it. Dealing with grief, the importance of family and friends, and more importantly, forgiveness. It makes heroes out of the geeks, a trend that I, a proud geek, am glad to see. I wish they had these films when I was a kid. In any case, is this Disney's best film? Not really. But it is excellent and funny and totally entertaining. I would recommend it for anyone.
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