Pixar’s first feature is still the cleanest argument for computer animation as a storytelling tool, not a stunt. Toy Story premiered at the El Capitan Theatre in Los Angeles on November 19, 1995, and hit U.S. theaters on November 22. It runs 81 minutes. It scored 8.0 out of 10 from TMDB voters across 20,487 votes.
Its premise is small and ruthless: toys are sentient, but they pretend to be lifeless whenever humans are in the room.
Trailer, via Disney Plus.
Woody, Buzz Lightyear, and Andy’s sixth birthday
Woody, voiced by Tom Hanks, is an old-fashioned cowboy doll and the favorite toy of a boy named Andy Davis. Andy’s family is preparing to move. At Andy’s sixth birthday party, the other toys — Mr. Potato Head, Slinky Dog, Rex, Hamm, Bo Peep — worry that a new gift will replace them.
Andy gets a Buzz Lightyear action figure, voiced by Tim Allen. Buzz does not know he is a toy. He believes he is an actual Space Ranger. He impresses the room with his electronic features and becomes Andy’s new favorite, which sets Woody’s jealousy running.
That jealousy is the engine of the film, and it is a mean little engine. Woody does not merely resent Buzz. He plots against him.
The window, the gas station, and Pizza Planet
Two days before the move, Andy’s family plans dinner at Pizza Planet. Woody tries to trap Buzz behind Andy’s desk so Andy will take him instead. He knocks Buzz out the window.
The other toys believe Woody murdered Buzz. They rebel against him. Andy takes Woody into the car, and Buzz follows. When the car stops at a gas station, Buzz confronts Woody, the two fight, and both fall out of the car and get left behind. They hitch a ride on a Pizza Planet delivery truck.
At Pizza Planet, Buzz mistakes a claw machine for a rocket and climbs in. Woody follows. Sid Phillips, Andy’s sadistic next-door neighbor, grabs both with the claw and takes them home. There they meet Sid’s mutant toys, built from parts of toys he has destroyed.
A television commercial and a broken arm
Buzz sees a commercial for Buzz Lightyear toys. It triggers an existential crisis. He finally understands that he is a toy. He tries to fly, falls, and breaks his arm off. Sid’s toys repair him. Sid tapes him to a firework rocket and plans to blow him up the next day.
The commercial does what no speech could. It is the moment the movie stops being a buddy comedy about jealousy and becomes something with a thesis about identity. Pixar earns that turn because it withholds it for most of the runtime.
Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, and a cast of sitcom ringers
Lasseter always wanted Hanks for Woody. He said Hanks “has the ability to take emotions and make them appealing. Even if the character, like the one in A League of Their Own, is down-and-out and despicable.” To test how an actor’s voice would fit, Lasseter borrowed a Disney technique: animate a vocal monologue from an established actor and meld the voice with the character’s actions. Early test footage using Hanks’ voice from Turner & Hooch convinced Hanks to sign on. Paul Newman, Robin Williams and Clint Eastwood were also considered for Woody.
Billy Crystal was approached for Buzz and given his own monologue, using dialogue from When Harry Met Sally…. He turned it down, believing the film would fail because of its animation. He later regretted it and took the role of Mike Wazowski in 2001’s Monsters, Inc. Bill Murray, Chevy Chase, Jim Carrey and a long list of others were considered for Buzz before Lasseter took the part to Tim Allen, then appearing in Disney’s Home Improvement.
The supporting cast is a murderers’ row of character actors: Don Rickles as Mr. Potato Head, Jim Varney as Slinky Dog, Wallace Shawn as Rex, John Ratzenberger as Hamm, Annie Potts as Bo Peep, R. Lee Ermey as Sergeant. John Morris voices Andy. Erik von Detten voices Sid. Laurie Metcalf voices Mrs. Davis.
A script that was halted and rebuilt
The film exists because of a 1988 short called Tin Toy. After its success, Disney approached Pixar about a computer-animated feature told from a small toy’s perspective. Lasseter, Andrew Stanton and Pete Docter wrote early story treatments. Disney rejected them and wanted an edgier tone.
After several disastrous story reels, production stopped. The script was rewritten to reflect the tone and theme Pixar wanted: “toys deeply want children to play with them, and … this desire drives their hopes, fears, and actions.” The studio was small at the time and made the film under minor financial constraints.
The credited writers are Joss Whedon, Andrew Stanton, Joel Cohen and Alec Sokolow. Katzenberg approved the script on January 19, 1993, and voice casting began then.
What holds up and what doesn’t
The animation is the part that has aged most visibly. Human faces are the weak spot; the toys are the triumph. That split is not an accident of the technology. The film was built from a toy’s point of view, and the toys are where the craft went.
The comedy holds. The tagline — “Hang on for the comedy that goes to infinity and beyond!” — oversells it, but the jokes land because the characters are written as people with jobs and status, not as merchandise. Woody’s fear is legible to any adult who has watched a workplace reorganize around a new hire.
What matters most is the structure. Toy Story is 81 minutes and wastes none of them. It sets a rule — toys freeze around humans — and never breaks it. It gives its antagonist a real grievance. It resolves the jealousy plot and the identity plot in the same act without letting either swallow the other.
The first entirely computer-animated feature film and the first feature from Pixar Animation Studios could have been a demo reel with a release date. Instead it is a buddy movie with a mean streak and a clean ending.
That is the part worth watching: the movie is not impressive because it was first. It is impressive because it is good.
- Directed by John Lasseter
- Written by Joss Whedon, Andrew Stanton, Joel Cohen, Alec Sokolow
- Runtime: 81 minutes
- Premiered at the El Capitan Theatre, Los Angeles: November 19, 1995
- U.S. theatrical release: November 22, 1995
- TMDB audience score: 8.0/10, 20,487 votes
Score: 8 of 10.
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