Pixar Meets James Bond in Cars 2

In the second season of Flight of the Conchords, the oddball HBO comedy about a pair of eccentric New Zealand folk musicians trying unsuccessfully to make it big in New York City, band manager Murray introduces New Zealand’s childlike Prime Minister, who is a little behind the times on most pop cultural matters. One of the first things he does is express his disappointment at not having seen the end of Cars, which was playing on the plane on his way over. These characters may all be hunks of metal, but you really do get invested in them. At least I do. I’ve been looking forward to Cars 2 all year.

At its heart, this sequel, like the original and like so many Pixar flicks, is primarily a buddy movie. Everything hangs on the friendship between humbled hotshot racecar Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson) and open-hearted redneck tow truck Mater (Larry the Cable Guy). Lightning is smooth and cool, while Mater is a first-class countrified goofball. He’s also my favorite character, so I was delighted to see that he is basically the central character this time around. While Lightning has more big races to win, Mater is the one who fuels the conflict and has the most exciting job to do.

The movie puts us right in the middle of the action with a car we’ve never met, sophisticated Aston Martin Finn McMissile (Michael Caine). It’s a dizzying opener indicative of many of the scenes to follow, with a lot happening at once, to the point of mild confusion. In the first movie, the racing scenes are chaotic, but they’re balanced out by the stretches of time in sleepy Radiator Springs. While we do spend a few minutes in that town and revisit the residents (with the exception of Paul Newman’s Doc Hudson, whose character died along with the actor who portrayed him), we mostly see them away from Radiator Springs, criss-crossing the globe along with their hometown hero.

Lightning’s international tour comes about because Mater locks heads with egotistical Italian speed demon Francesco Bernoulli (John Turturro) over his derisive comments about Lightning on a call-in TV show. Their on-the-air showdown prompts Lightning to intervene and pledge his intention to forego a relaxing summer vacation in favor of a jet-setting, high-pressure one. Once they arrive at the site of the first race, overwhelmed Mater can scarcely contain his excitement, especially once he believes he has scored a date with a hot car, Holley Shiftwell (Emily Mortimer). His exuberance embarrasses Lightning and causes him some serious trouble, leading to a falling-out. For most of the movie, then, Mater is off on his own, trying to find a sense of purpose in a world where he always seems to be doing the wrong thing.

Little does he realize that thanks to Holley, he has now become entangled in a web of international espionage. After mistakenly identifying him as a fellow spy, she and Finn continue to work with Mater and issue instructions to him, but the movie is half-over before Mater really begins to understand what is going on. They think his dopeyness is a cover, an act to throw people off, rather like the signature schtick of expert detective Columbo as played by the late great Peter Falk. It’s not. However, there is one thing he really knows, and that is engines. Hence, he picks up on details that others would miss, and this knowledge proves very useful even if he is in completely over his head as a spy. What’s more, even though he’s just being himself, his bumpkin mannerisms do throw most people off, and that sometimes works to his advantage as well. But can he, Finn and Holley put a stop to the dangerous shenanigans that are threatening the well-being of cars around the world?

Cars 2, directed by John Lasseter and Brad Lewis, is an entertaining and eye-popping movie. Part buddy comedy and part James Bond spoof, it revels in complex action sequences and sly visual jokes. I love the way the movie presents visions of Japan, Italy and England that are rich in recognizable detail but skewered to fit this vehicular world. The high-tech zaniness of Tokyo is discombobulating but amusing, particularly during a sequence in which Mater uses the restroom and is confronted with a trippy talking computer. I loved the sunny brilliance of the Italian cityscape, though I didn’t catch which city it was. It’s in Italy that we actually have a chance to slow down for a bit as Lightning and his friends get the royal welcome from a relative of his pit crew. Then, of course, there’s London, which has been featured in so many Disney movies. Big Ben(tley) is the starting point of a pretty thrilling sequence, and Vanessa Redgrave lends her voice to an endearing vehicular version of Queen Elizabeth II.

When I heard that Pixar was planning a sequel to Toy Story, I was skeptical, but it ended up impressing me just as much as the first movie (and the third reduced me to a blubbering puddle of goo). While I enjoyed the movie, I don’t think that Cars 2 is quite that kind of home run. The first movie is so much about hometown pride and a group of eccentric characters teaching the arrogant but lonely Lightning that there’s more to life than winning races. While Mater is even more prominent in this movie than in the first, the rest of the characters take a backseat, appearing in only a few scenes and not adding that much to the overall story. Meanwhile, aside from Finn, Holley and Francesco, I found the new characters hard to latch onto. Despite the core friendship between Lightning and Mater, the movie feels most concerned with being a send-up of spy films, and as such, it is less focused on character than on explosive displays. Some of these scenes are a lot of fun, but sometimes the movie seems to get a bit bogged down. There’s also the thread of big oil versus alternative fuel running through the sequel, and the ultimate point seems to push going green, but the message is a bit convoluted.

One thing that Pixar fans have come to depend on is end-credits fun, and Cars 2 doesn’t disappoint in that respect. While I think I laughed more at the credits for Cars, I did enjoy the flat, retro-style vignettes showing a series of postcards involving various characters. I also liked the end-credits songs, particularly Brad Paisley’s Nobody’s Fool, a touching song from the perspective of Mater as he realizes how the world perceives him and struggles to come to terms with that identity.

Meanwhile, like the other Pixar movies, this one includes a short before the main feature. While most tend to be wordless and feature characters exclusive to that short, this time around we get to check up on the Toy Story gang in the cute Hawaiian Vacation, which finds Woody, Buzz and the whole gang trying to create an idyllic beach retreat for Ken and Barbie after their plan to stow away in Bonnie’s backpack fails to land them passage on her trip to Hawaii. In just a few minutes, each character gets a moment or two in the spotlight. In fact, I would say the short does a more effective job of highlighting Woody’s posse than the feature does of highlighting most of the Radiator Springs residents. They do have their moments, but most of them end up getting a bit lost in the shuffle.

In the end, then, I like Cars 2, but it felt a little too glitzy to me and lacking just a bit in the character department. I’ve heard some comments that this one was all about the money and that it was a disgrace to the Pixar name, and I can’t agree with that. Nonetheless, after two years of sequels, I am really looking forward to the next original Pixar movie.