Cars 3 (2017)

 

Genre: Comedy/ Sports

Time: 1h 49mins

Director: Brian Fee

Quick Summary: Lightning McQueen sets out to prove to a new generation of racers that he's still the best race car in the world.

Oh my poor little heart

This was such a sweet and heartfelt watch after watching the other two as this feels so much more mature and hits you right in the emotions. It knows its audience is grown up and it uses that to explore themes like legacies, traditions, preservation and the "human" connection. Admittedly, I did feel bad for McQueen, since he's getting older and can no longer be at the top of his game. It's hard for people to know when to quit, as to them it's giving up their life and they frantically try to keep hold of it. A good portion of this film is that. 

The animation is fantastic, it's rich in colour, gorgeously designed and the attention to detail is incredible. The racing scenes are mini-masterpieces of editing as to be expected. Also, there are car crash scenes which boy, they did not need to go as detailed with them but I am so glad they did because those are some of the most interesting moments of the film. The cars, if they didn't have eyes in their windshield, I would have said were actual recordings of cars at times because of how well the animation looked. 

This isn't all doom and gloom, it has a good handful of silly fun moments. Like a whole scene where it's basically a free-for-all wrestling match in the mud. It's such a hectic scene but it really broke up the moments between the heavy emotions. Or McQueen is forced to do a dance-styled workout, but he is just sitting there deadpan. Something I personally enjoyed as well was the amount of old man jokes that were made to him. 

One addition I did find to be very mixed is Cruz Ramirez. At first, I found her very annoying and very whiny, as well as useless. She does have a lot of development (No spoilers!), but honestly, she was really underdeveloped and by the end, it felt like she could just suddenly do everything. There was a lot of heart to her, but she didn't bring too much to the story apart from being a plot device for McQueen's next step. 

The humour was also a very mixed bag since only half of them landed. They pretty much dropped Mater as the comedic relief, which really this film could have done to pick it up during some of the duller moments, but I'm glad they didn't have him in every scene or I feel like the mood of the film would have been ruined. 

Hopefully, they keep this as the final film because this was such as good ending for everything. Everything is neatly tied up and honestly, I don't want to know anything else after this one. It's very emotional, so be warned.

8/10

"Don't fear failure. Be afraid of not having the chance, you have the chance!"

"Jackson Storm: You have no idea what a pleasure it is for me to finally beet you.

Lightning McQueen: Thanks... Wait, did you say meet or beet?

Jackson Storm: I think you heard me."

"You'll never be the racer you once were. You can't turn back the clock, kid. But you can wind it up again."