I didn’t have high expectations but the movie redeemed itself for me… just barely. Maybe that’s just because I’m a dog person and stories of a girl/boy and their loyal dog will always give me a warm fuzzy feeling… :)

Some thoughts-
-anyone notice the parallels to Inspector Gadget in the “Bolt” TV show? (Girl named Penny in danger, trying to help her father, protected by a dog with special abilities, villain associated with cats…) Was this intentional???

-unlike most of you, I found the hamster and various pigeons incredibly annoying…. almost ruined the movie for me. The hamster was well designed and animated, but the fanboy thing got old really quick, it’s been done better before (Incredibles), etc. The pigeons I have nothing good to say about (even the supposed “realism” of the way they were animated was just distracting to me).

-Mittens on the other hand, I liked. I was worried at first that she’d just be a generic “sassy New Yorker” character, but there was some nice character development there.

-Eyes in CG animation still creep me out… they look like very shiny glass orbs implanted in the characters’ skulls, and the animators feel the need to make them constantly twitch around, I guess to make them look “alive.” What’s even worse is that the characters in Bolt had enormous eyes, even the adult humans… they all looked like those old velvet paintings of the orphan girl with the huge tear-filled eyes… way over the top.

-Overall, I thought the design of the human characters was pretty horrible. They looked like plastic dolls. The mom was the same generic “mom” that’s been showing up in cartoons for … at least 15 years (not to mention she was a complete blank as a character… even the people in the animal shelter had more personality than her).

-I gotta agree with the person who pointed out the inconsistency of the backgrounds… I noticed that too. Sometimes they seemed photorealistic, then they looked like a watercolor… which looked weird with hyperrealistically textured characters in front of them…

-The opening action sequence was well done. Very exciting!

-I think the moment the movie came alive for me was when Mittens was showing Bolt how to beg… nice character animations and I think it brought the characters down to earth in a nice way.

-Loved the end credits! Wish the whole movie looked that charming and well-designed. :-)

-Again, despite my complaints, I did think the ending brought the film to an appropriate, genuinely heartwarming conclusion.

I think many of the things that didn’t work in this movie, for me, point to what I see as the central paradox of CG animation (at least as it’s done in big-studio movies currently)– the medium encourages a progression towards more and more realism, the end product of which would be …. a film indistinguishable from live action. So what’s the point? And the striving towards realism creates characters that often feel TOO detailed… to me animation is about the power of simplifying the world down to the essentials for whatever you’re trying to communicate, exaggerating certain things for effect, and putting your own touch as an artist into it. (The book “Understanding Comics” shaped some of my views on this.) It feels like so much of this has been lost in CG. Too many characters look the same, move the same, and too much time/effort is spent on shiny fur/feathers/skin instead of strong design and creativity. Well, all this has been said before….

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I agree with Jerry, it’s not really competing with Bond or Twilight, and I’m guessing it will pick up speed starting….now.

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Well, she can pounce on them when they come down to feed and they don’t see her coming. (And I personally didn’t expect the — SPOILER!!!! – missing claws payoff.)

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I enjoyed it a lot. Laughed, cried, and went ‘awww!’ and ‘wow!’ at all the parts they probably hoped we would. It’s a story that any one of us could have written, I’m sure, but that didn’t detract from it in any way, in my opinion. Sometimes, you just want an hour and a half of feel-good entertainment, and this movie fits the bill.

Some things that struck me:

The movement and iridescence of the pigeons: Yes, I kept expecting to hear “Ahr you cooin’ my bird?” but they sure didn’t move like the Good Feathers. This is another good example of Disney animators taking the time to study their subjects and translate it to the screen with care and finesse. Well done, gang!

Little nuances that added up: As the movie progresses, Rhino’s ball gets more and more scratched up. Niiice! Also, the rain fall on Bolt and the halos around the lights on the Animal Control Truck, well done.

Coincidence? Irony? Remember a movie waaaaay back in the late 70’s, early 80’s, called “Animalympics”? There was a character, an alligator from the sewers of New York by the name of Bolt Jenkins, who was voiced to sound like John Travolta playing a young, punk kid, such as Danny Zuko or Vinnie Barbarino. And here we have a dog, by the name of Bolt, being voiced by John Travolta. The connection made me chuckle and received a lot of “oh, hey!”s when I mentioned it to those with whom I’d seen the movie.

And finally, Like Ratatouille, it’s fun to see the animators playing with the credits. I spotted a very 60’s looking Bambi in there!

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I had the same reaction to the voice acting as Steve Gattuso did. For instance, I’m so removed from anything connected to Miley Cyrus that I literally don’t know her when I hear her … and I thought she was great in this movie. Go figure.

My complaint about Bolt is more a theoretical one than a dig on the movie itself: This isn’t what I want to see Disney doing. This film played it SO safe and by the numbers that I felt cheated by it – like it was Disney product, not art. Disney has always been known as an innovator. There was nothing innovative about Bolt. It was just … there. It entertained the kiddies and it made the parents laugh occasionally. That’s great, but I want more than that, dang it.

Here’s hoping this is the start of Disney’s new journey, and not the final destination.

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