LOU

The point of the Academy Award-nominated "Lou" seems to be that we all have good in our hearts, we sometimes just need motivation to find it. I do agree that motivation and reminding someone of goodness works better than punishment. Not any kind of masterpiece, but worth seeing.

This is a funny short and the animation is some of the zaniest that Pixar has done. But the redemption of the bully is unearned because it is ultimately transactional. It is very funny and enjoyable but it is missing the depth of other Pixar works.

Pixar Studios has won a lot of Oscars over the years--many of them for Best Animated Short. "LOU" is their latest nomination and is a very pleasant little film. However, it's NOT among the studio's best shorts and is relatively pedestrian....but I still think it will win this year...mostly because the other nominees are a very weak bunch. As I noticed one other reviewer say in their summary, "Yet another win for Pixar animation"!

The film is hard to describe. It's set on a playground at a school and somehow a pile of lost and found objects have become sentient and take on a weird form. Later, they teach a bully a lesson.

The film, start to finish, looks great. This is no surprise at all as the best animated films in the world are coming from Pixar and Disney Studios. While I liked it and respect the quality of the production, it also seemed very safe and not particularly inspiring or out of the ordinary.

LOU is an unseen creature made out of stuff from the LOst and foUnd box in the schoolyard. It cleans up after the kids while they are in class. It is dismayed at J.J. bullying the other kids. It battles J.J. to return stuff stolen from the other children.

This is a Pixar short that comes with the movie Cars 3. It's perfectly fine family viewing especially for the kids. In a way, it fits well with Cars 3 which is also perfectly fine. The creature design of random objects is a little usual. It is able to be cute without being creepy. This is perfectly fine.

'LOU': Four Stars (Out of Five)

A 6-minute Pixar animated short film, which plays before 'CARS 3' in theaters, about a monster that lives inside a lost-and-found box. The short was written and directed by debut filmmaker Dave Mullins; a veteran animator who's previously worked on multiple feature Pixar films (including 'CARS' and 'CARS 2'). The short, like everything from Pixar, is of course visually beautiful to watch, at all times. It's also funny, creative and it even has a great message about not bullying others (at the end). It has pretty much everything you've come to expect from a Pixar short film. This one isn't quite as emotional as my favorite Pixar shorts are though, even though it touches on a subject very close to me (bullying). Which I've had to deal with all of my life, including adulthood. Still it's always visually creative and amusing to watch. It's definitely entertaining too, for kids and adults, and it does have a very positive message. The short is yet another win for Pixar animation.

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