MONSTERS UNIVERSITY is the most soul-destroying movie Pixar has ever assembled, which says a lot considering the stinging film moments they have devised in the past to wring tears out of its patrons. I frankly really liked the movie at times, drawn into its imaginative world of creature colleges and accepting this prequel to MONSTERS, INC. that really didn't need to be told. Yet, the makers constantly wanted to ruin the fun, slopping on more misery for its lead monsters to endure and never, ever be able to overcome. This is Pixar's Death of a Salesman, proclaiming to the kids in the audience that the Little Engine may think he can but he really can't and he should stop trying. After all, he is just a little train.
Mike Wazowski (voiced again by Billy Crystal) has always wanted to be a professional "scarer", ever since he was a cute little green ball going on school field trip to the Monsters, Inc. factory. Hitting the books and devoting all of his child and teenage time to learning its practice, he is later accepted into Monsters University as a scare major. Though he is a pint-sized, nerdy outcast and mocked by others, he does not let any of that negativity affect his passion and dreams. At this higher learning, he develops a love-hate friendship with Mike Sully (returning John Goodman), a dim-witted but intimidating jock who is clearly riding on his family's name in the business. When some major setbacks cost them their future in the program, they both team up with the lowly fraternity of Oozma Kappa ("We're OK!") in order to win the Scare Games, a competition with other more popular fraternities and sororities, and succeed on their bet with the Dean of the scare school, Abigail Hardscrabble (Helen Mirren). However, bad things continue to happen and the third act sours any hope.
This is a movie that has a hard time sticking to one tone. It first engages the viewer with the life of a monster campus, showing off the colorful range of different beasts and the structure of the majors they seek to earn diplomas for. Then, the film just halts this plot so it can regurgitate REVENGE OF THE NERDS, having the slobs of Oozma Kappa face off against shallow blondes and the collar-popping male elite. Once it reaches its logical and exciting final contest in the Scare Games, the story again quickly curbs its development in order to move towards a plot line where the leads sit around wallowing in melancholy while in a dangerous environment. Though I loved the aspects of the first act the most, the makers do not create an accurate or fair college setting. For example, a couple of characters are much later expelled for their devious actions and it completely justifiable. However, there's a moment where all of the other surviving teams pull a CARRIE prank on the Oozmas, throwing paint and glitter on them to make them "cute", and then further employ cruel humiliation by plastering a picture of them all over the Quad, on a giant poster hung over a bell tower, and on t-shirts they are selling for "charity". Where is the discipline for this? Why do I have to watch the innocent suffer?
The film also kinda advocates racism, especially in the institutionalized sense. Mike is forcibly kicked out of the scare program specifically because Dean Hardscrabble judges him entirely on his exterior appearance, deeming him to be too cute to ever creep out anyone. First off, fear is entirely subjective; anything can be frightening to an individual, whether it is a bug, water, or even a Precious Moments figurine. Hell, one of my aunts literally bolts out of the room every time someone puts their own arm around the back of their neck. Secondly, if a monster's appearance is such a problem, what happened when Mike possibly had to have a personal interview for a position as a major? Did he ace that along with his extensive personal knowledge? Third, how is that Mike and his non-existent parents who are paying his way through the school are not suing the university of every dime for this intolerance? This is beyond excusable, made even worst by the fact that Mike has to and does accept his failure at being a physically monstrous candidate. Mind you even that everybody in this entire universe can be described as cute, including the old superstar scarers seen later. You wanna spoil yourself and know what are the truly scary monsters in this film? All of the human figures. Seriously, there is a gaggle of little children at the end and they were all constructed horribly, like watching dead-eyed dolls with rotten meat stapled to their animation rigs.
The voice cast is delightful, especially Joel Murray as a friendly middle-age student, but has a major problem with its leads. Mike and Sully are supposed to be 18 years old by the film's logic and their actors are clearly way too old to be playing them, most definitely in the case with Goodman. The jokes are very funny and will stick with you, the callbacks and foreshadowing are cute at best, plus you get an amusing little short film of umbrellas looking for love on a rainy and breathtakingly realistic city street. I truly wish to love this more but I morally can't give it high points. If only this film would stop with all of its unending malaise. To make this movie even more sad, it's a bit distressing that we are watching characters wishing to be scarers when as we later see in the first film that the job has a finite history and will lead to diminishing energy returns.
FINAL REVIEW: 3 / 5
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