Loveday Writing

Pioneered and highlighted their then-new technological style:

As mentioned in my Toy Story analysis, certain explosions and water droplets weren’t seen as these animations were either too complex or impossible to be done. These things were possible in the years that passed. According to IMDb, insects were within the reach of computer animation at the time, due to their relatively simple surfaces and water droplets through rain and dew can be seen throughout the film. What makes this progression and achievement even more impressive is that the water droplets had to be programmed manually as it was impossible to program complex physics using particle animation back then. The insect designs were surprisingly complex as well and apparently Pixar’s computers struggled to keep up with the demands that animating them required.

Made a film that focused on great attention to detail and storytelling:

According to Wikipedia and IMDb, A Bug’s Life is based on The Ant and the Grasshopper from Aesop’s Fables.

The Ant and the Grasshopper focuses on a grasshopper who spends the spring and summer months singing and dancing whilst the ants gather food for the winter months. When winter comes, the grasshopper finds itself starving and begs the ants for food, however the ants refuses to give the grasshopper some of its food as the grasshopper didn’t do the work in gathering it. The screenwriters for A Bug’s Life based the film on the idea that the grasshopper could just take the food.

The opening minutes of the film show the ants gathering food for the grasshoppers, so that the grasshoppers will leave them alone. However, Flik accidentally destroys the offering stone which leads to the ants losing the food, which leads to Hopper, the grasshoppers’ leaders demanding that the ants gather twice as much food for compensation before winter comes.

As the movie is about bugs and their lives on Ant Island, the attention to detail on the grass, trees, ground, and various objects on the ground was incredible, especially with the objects being larger than the bugs, and being used for purposes conducive to bug life.  

The attention to detail with the characters and different bugs overall was inconsistent as the real-life facts of bugs was adapted to fit the characters and the story. For example, the Gypsy moth character, Gypsy, can fly but in reality only the males of the species can fly not the females. Another example is the fact that the ants were given two arms and two legs, as opposed to the six legs they actually have, to make them more likeable, and the grasshoppers were given more appendages to make them unlikeable.

Setting the precedent for future films:

A Bug’s Life is the first Pixar film to have outtakes during the end credits, and not only that, but the outtakes in this film contained Woody from Toy Story and even included the line, ‘to infinity and beyond!’ from Toy Story. A Bug’s Life is also the first Pixar film to feature the credits ‘Walt Disney Pictures Presents’ and ‘A Pixar Animation Studios Film’ in the opening sequence. This would also be the first Pixar film to end with the words ‘the end’ before the credits start to roll and a tradition that would be continued with films that had co-director, Andrew Stanton, as the main director.

According to IMDb, the original “teaser” trailer for this film was made up of animation made especially for the trailer and not appearing in the final film. This practice would go on to become a Pixar trademark. Another Pixar trademark that would be established with this film would be Pixar’s logo with Luxo Jr. bouncing and squashing the letter ‘I,’ which appears after the Disney logo.

Themes of hope, happiness, and togetherness:

Hope – The theme of hope is present when Flik comes up with the idea of creating a fake bird to scare Hopper away, as the plan gives the ants hope that Hopper and his gang will leave them alone once he sees it.

Happiness – The ants arguably live a miserable existence throughout the film due to being under Hopper’s thumb and end up living a life of happiness at the end of the film when they stand up to Hopper and the other grasshoppers, and especially after Hopper dies.

Togetherness – This theme can be seen as literal as the ants, grasshoppers, and circus bugs stay with their own at the start of the film, with the grasshoppers coming to see the ants to bully them for food and Flik bringing the circus bugs to Ant Island. Despite the misunderstanding between the circus bugs and Flik early in the film, the circus bugs gain the respect of the ants and try to help them.

My overall thoughts:

Having to follow the massive success of Pixar’s debut film, Toy Story, A Bug’s Life had a lot of pressure on its shoulders. Overall, I felt that a story focusing on the life of ants and grasshoppers was a natural progression from a story that focused on the life of toys as these perspective are unique, creative, and people wouldn’t think about these creatures much in their daily lives.

The animation had improved with the scenery and attention to detail and character movements being just that little bit crisper in comparison to its predecessor. There were also more characters in this film, albeit with the majority of them being the same or a similar design. However, just like with Toy Story, I could see where the film was dated as I watched it through 2023 eyes, especially with the physical design of the ants.

As someone who had never seen A Bug’s Life until now, I appreciated the film’s animation and the attention to detail, but I did find the story hard to engage with. While I’m not a squeamish person, I guess I just didn’t find following the life of bugs all that interesting.

The next part of the Pixar Era Analysis series will be released next week and will focus on Toy Story 2.

Fun Facts and Trivia:

• The first Pixar film not to have humans.
• The first Pixar film not to become a franchise.
• The first Pixar film to have a death and a dedication.
• Pixar’s second animated feature film and the only one outside the Toy Story franchise to be released both in the 1990s and 20^th century.
• The first Pixar film to only have ‘A113’ appear once.
• Hopper is the first Pixar villain to die, in contrast, his brother, Molt, is the first Pixar villain to redeem himself at the end of the film.
• Molt was created for the film to provide some comic relief out of the more uncomfortable moments with Hopper, but it was later decided that he would be Hopper’s brother as Hopper would never allow somebody as witless and annoying as Molt to stay with the gang otherwise.
• The train that the circus bugs use is called ‘Casey Junior,’ which is named after the circus train in Dumbo.
• The DVD version of the film was the first ever all-digital video transfer.

References:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Bug%27s_Life
• https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120623/trivia/?ref_=tt_trv_trv
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ant_and_the_Grasshopper
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_svBrlehmMo