However, essentially, the directors have their relationship change within that single scene. They are bonding–developing and rebuilding a relationship. The best scene in the movie occurs when Merida and Mother Bear (Queen Elinor) fish with one another. The first act is far too long, whereas the second and third act are improperly developed.
So, from a story point, get to the Suitor competition earlier, have her visit the Witch sooner, have the Bear/Mother transformation happen earlier, and ultimately, give yourself some more script space for….įor a movie that is so conventional in its structure, Brave feels oddly misshapen. The film is about a mother and daughter learning to understand each other (think Finding Nemo with reversed gender roles). Brave shouldn’t waste so much time examining the fact that she’s an unconventional princess, because that’s not really what the movie is about. That still doesn’t excuse the fact that she’s a walking stock character (C’mon! Splitting the arrow! Mel Brooks killed that shtick 19 years ago with Robin Hood Men in Tights). Holy crap, is that a cliché starting point! Major props to Pixar for giving us a female centric lead character. I suppose you could argue that all this Bohemian frolicking is used to develop Merida’s character, but honestly, is her character really that deep? She’s a Princess who is being forced to live a life she does not want. Instead, we get a lot of exposition of her being a free spirit, including an opening song montage. But, Brave would have really benefited from cutting a good 10 to 15 minutes from its first act, and basically starting with the scene where Merida is “auditioning” her suitors. Yeah…yeah…it’s an ancient screenwriting tip: start in medias res. Here it is, ladies and germs, the Top 10 Ways to Fix Pixar’s Brave.
Instead of just criticizing what doesn’t work, let’s workshop this sucker until it actually does. But, in what is probably the larger point, it could have been so good. For one, as the CinemaScore would suggest, Brave isn’t a bad movie–it’s just a spectacularly mediocre one as Douglas Adams would say, “mostly harmless.” Well, considering this is coming from the studio that has produced over the past 17 years a voluminous cannon of movies unmatched by anybody else in Hollywood, mediocre just doesn’t cut it for me. Now, granted I’m sure many of you are already exceedingly weary of all the Brave chatter and articles, but a movie such as this fascinates me. Well, now that the dust has settled and the internet has gone on to complain about new things, I thought it might be an apt time to examine film in more detail. Pixar’s Brave has received a mixed critical response.
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