The Incredibles vs The Ice Storm

Pixar gets a lot of praise for making movies for kids that adults can appreciate too. It's really bullshit, of course. What Pixar does is make good movies, period. A movie that kids like that you think sucks? Probably sucks. You know what kids like? They like spinning around until they get dizzy. They like to write their names in glue, and then pour glitter over it. The really little ones like keys. Just keys, hanging on a ring. Kids, you see, aren't exactly a barometer of taste. I think, actually, that Pixar makes movies for adults who can't find a babysitter.

Luckily, they show these things at odd hours, because half of you can't shut yourselves up at the movies, let alone your kids, and I'm patient in many circumstances, but not that one. I saw The Incredibles at night during the week. Adults only, thank you very much.

The Incredibles is set in a city full of superheroes—Supers—who police the city and have the respect and admiration every citizen. Foremost among them is Mr. Incredible, along with his peers Elastigirl and Frozone. They're all thinly-veiled types you've seen before, even if you're not a regular comic or cartoon fan. Mr. Incredible makes the mistake of saving a suicide jumper who didn't want to be saved, and finds himself the subject of a huge lawsuit. Soon, the Supers have fallen under close public and government scrutiny, and a sort of blacklist mentality drives them all into retirement.

Years later, Mr. Incredible has settled into domestic suburban apathy, as his alter ego, Bob Parr. His wife, of course, is Helen, the former Elastigirl, and they have two kids, Dash and Violet, whose names give a clue to the powers they possess but aren't allowed to use outside the house. There's also a baby, Jack Jack, who seems to just be a regular kid.

Although Bob has become an out-of-shape insurance agency drone (his boss is a cross between Yosemite Sam and Jerry Lundegaard) after hours he still patrols the streets with his buddy Lucius Best, the former Frozone. Bob misses his days as Mr. Incredible, when he inspired people, when he mattered. He's like one of those guys who can't stop talking about the big touchdown senior year. Bob is being watched, though. He receives a mysterious file, Mission: Impossible-style, offering him a chance to be Mr. Incredible once again. He accepts, and our adventure begins.

What transpires is as exciting and instantly classic as Raiders of the Lost Ark, or the first Christopher Reeve Superman. Like those movies, The Incredibles is hardly an original (The Fantastic Four is the most obvious influence, but you'll find everything from Star Wars to John Hughes, without even looking that closely), but it comes across not even as homage, but rather as some amazing adventure you've somehow missed out on. When people say they don't make ‘em like they used to, well, here you go. The Incredibles, as you can guess, is visually amazing. In case you were wondering, computer-generated hair, water and snow have been nearly perfected. There are action set-pieces in The Incredibles that are truly exhilarating, like a chase through a jungle, a downtown battle with a giant rolling robot, and Elasticgirl sneaking through a series of blast-doors that close before she's done sneaking. That they take place amidst an effective story—one that includes family drama, social commentary and non-cliched issues of self-esteem for teens and adults—is fairly, well, you know.

The Incredibles was written and directed by Brad Bird, who I'm guessing goes to the movies and reads comic books every single day. Bird knows his way around a pulp plot, and paces The Incredibles perfectly. The voice talent has been expertly chosen. I'm not naming them here, but trust me, it's not a cast that was chosen for its marquee value. I think the campaign for Shark Tale is one of the tackiest of recent memory; it seems so blatant that the cast was chosen for name recognition before considering how appropriate each was for the characters. I'm sure it's fun and all, but if an animated character is well-played, what's it matter if it's Angelina Jolie or if it's Sarah Vowell, as long as you believe in the character?

After the energy and humor of The Incredibles, you might want to check out Brad Bird's other impressive animated movie, The Iron Giant. It's pretty swell, and is grossly underappreciated. The Incredibles' vision of suburban ennui really stuck with me though, and reminded me of another troubled family, the not-so-Supers of The Ice Storm.

What were you expecting? Finding Nemo? Hey, I'm an adult. While it's perfectly fine for me to watch cartoons all day long (which I do from time to time), I don't have to. I can get my Rated R on any time I want, bitches. But The Ice Storm isn't just here because it's a change of pace.

In a just world, The Ice Storm would have been as appreciated as American Beauty. But while the characters in American Beauty found moments of hope and excitement by acting outside the bounds of their environments, the characters of The Ice Storm are only punished. Something that seems thrilling and naughty, like shoplifting or having an affair—even playing with fireworks—only brings more pain and more sadness, and hey, look, I think it's starting to rain.

The Ice Storm is set in the early 1970s in Connecticut, just before and after Thanksgiving. Everything is shot in shades of blue and gray, and the sound is recorded at such a degree that there's never any true silence, only moments when talking stops, but breathing continues, alongside things like the noises made by dishes in a sink, or waves inside a waterbed mattress, or the ice outside, falling from the trees. The Ice Storm was directed by Ang Lee, who knows exactly what he's doing.

Kevin Kline and Joan Allen star as a Ben and Elena, a couple unmentionably unhappily living in suburbia. They have two kids, played by just-on-the-verge Christina Ricci and Tobey Maguire. They're trying to have a peaceful Thanksgiving, but there's so much tension among them they can barely make it past grace. Ben is having an affair with Janey (Sigourney Weaver), who seems to have taken him on as a lover simply because they work a similar schedule, as if she's having coffee with one of the other mothers, not because they're compatible as friends, but because they have to pick up the kids from practice at the same time. When Ben wants to talk after sex, Janey tells him “I have a husband,” meaning, she already has to hear about one boring day, so put your pants on already. Janey has two sons of her own, played by Elijah Wood and Adam Hann-Byrd, both of whom have been experimenting with Ricci. Meanwhile, Elena is trying to find something, anything spontaneous in her life, while having a slow, quiet, invisible meltdown.

The Ice Storm is as difficult to watch as The Incredibles is easy. Like its animated cousin, however, The Ice Storm is beautiful, well-timed, and masterfully acted. Sigourney Weaver, Joan Allen, Kevin Kline and Jamey Sheridan (as Janey's husband) all give complicated, subtle performances (Weaver channels what could have been pages of melodramatic dialogue into the act of curling up on a bed). And, the younger cast members were so well-chosen, I think maybe Ang Lee is from the future. At the end of The Ice Storm, after all the drama, and affairs and the freezing and the slipping and the swapping, the family rejoins, much like the Incredibles and the Fantastic Four (which is referenced early in the film). They don't have powers, and they haven't saved anyone or even done a single admirable thing, except stay together and stand there like everything's fine, which let's face it, is sometimes as super a thing as you can muster.

The Incredibles: A
The Ice Storm: A