Let me start by saying Inside Out is cute and fun with a lot of clever psychology jokes. However, I felt there were some major holes, unanswered questions, and strange implications that were side effects of the film's premise.
First off, Inside Out could be a great example of the things you're not supposed to do in a screenplay. Like narration. Occasionally narration can be okay, even good, but, far more often, it's either lazy storytelling or clearly added because some idiots in a focus group were confused, so execs added narration to spell things out for lowest-common-denominator Americans. At its best, great filmmaking doesn't even require dialogue to tell the story. Inside Out's narration is completely unnecessary, and is worth a sin.
The other screenwriting no-no that bugged me is something I hate any time I see it: internal conflict. Having characters struggle with internal conflict is fine, even great character development, as long as there is some personified antagonist representing that conflict or drawing it out. But when a film lacks an antagonist, I find it lacks conflict, and becomes boring for me personally. Now, I realize I'm basically faulting the movie for its basic premise, so shame on me, I guess.
And, remember, this is coming from a guy who loves Pixar and typically applauds them for their generally clever writing, emotional storytelling, and overall higher quality than DreamWorks.
Now that that's out of the way, let's get into some existential plot holes and paradoxes.
How does the relations between the emotions and Riley work? Joy and friends have a control panel with which they make Riley feel emotions, and they give her ideas. They seem to be controlling her like pilots of a ship. The same is true of all the other humans we see. So are people merely vessels controlled by these emotions? Joy and gang constantly refer to Riley as if she's a separate person. They care about her wellbeing as if it's different from their own. It's not "I" and "me", but "she" and "her." This language suggests that Riley has a separate consciousness from the emotions. Is that part of head not personified? What exactly is the relationship here?
I might be faulting the movie's premise again, but let's talk about the emotions. Each of then seem to experience the full range of emotions. We certainly see Joy experience sadness, anger, fear, and disgust. Which is fine. None of them would be able to undergo any sort of character arc if they were completely one-dimensional representations of their respective emotion. However, if they themselves are capable of feeling other emotions, why do Disgust, Fear, and Anger have so much trouble running Riley while Joy and Sadness are adventuring? Shouldn't they operate more like the Faceless Men of Bravos and be able to switch places willy-nilly? Or what's the point of having the five emotions in the first place if they are all capable of having other feelings? Does Joy have a team of emotions piloting her? Is life just an endless paradox of emotions controlling emotions?
Something else that confuses me is the gender assignment of the emotions. Riley has a mix of masculine and feminine personifications of her emotions, which is fine. I just find it odd that every other head we see in the film has all of their emotions match their body's gender. Men have their emotions personified as a being men. Women's emotions are 100% women. Is is some intentional commentary on Riley's character? Is it suggesting that Riley is still discovering who see is and her emotions will change as she becomes an adult and discovers her identity? Is it some commentary on her future sexuality (the film does keep away from the debunked works of Freud)? Or is it just a gag, because having all the females in Mom being annoyed with all the males in Dad is funny; because gender conflict!
My final existential question is about the opening of the film. Joy comes into existence at Riley's birth. I don't mean to start a religious debate here, but the film is certainly making some statement about a person's perception or lack thereof in the womb vs out. I like to believe Pixar wasn't trying to make such commentary, but, rather were cleverly referencing Lacanian psychology or someone similar with the theory that you don't develop a separate identity from your mother until you've left the womb (and seen yourself in a mirror, according to Lacan).
Sure, I'm a heartless, cold miser for hating on this adorable children's film. But, in my defense, it was also boring and predictable. If it weren't for the clever humor, I probably would've been really disappointed. However, the witty psychology jokes do give Inside Out enough points to earn this one-line review:
"It's still a better movie than Cars."
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