Princess Merida of the clan Dunbroch is given a bow and arrow by her father, King Fergus for her sixth birthday. Her mother, Queen Elinor, is dismayed by the present - it is her ambition to make her daughter 'a proper princess of royalty', and that does not include archery - but Merida is thrilled.
Ten years later, Merida has become a skilled archer, but her independent streak and lack of interest in 'feminine pursuits' is a continuing point of conflict between her and her mother. This ongoing situation finally comes to a head when Fergus and Elinor announce their intention to betroth Merida to the son of one of Fergus's allies.
Merida uses her archery skills to thwart the planned betrothal, but this provokes a fierce argument with her mother. Merida flees into the forest, where she makes the fundamental fairy tale error of making a deal with a witch. Most of the movie will be occupied with her efforts to rectify the disasters that spiral out of that mistake.
Brave is a Pixar-animated film. It unsurprisingly looks and sounds great, with fun character designs, smooth animation, and a well-chosen voice cast. It also features much of Pixar's fun writing, which gleefully exploits the fact that the film is animated to do things that simply couldn't be done in live-action, such as slapstick comedy involving bears. Speaking of comedy, the film is frequently very funny, with a lot of sight gags, snappy repartee, and other comedic elements.
Brave is a Pixar-animated film. It unsurprisingly looks and sounds great, with fun character designs, smooth animation, and a well-chosen voice cast. It also features much of Pixar's fun writing, which gleefully exploits the fact that the film is animated to do things that simply couldn't be done in live-action, such as slapstick comedy involving bears. Speaking of comedy, the film is frequently very funny, with a lot of sight gags, snappy repartee, and other comedic elements.
Despite its many positive qualities, however, I can't quite put Brave into the top echelon of Pixar movies. It's good, but it's not The Incredibles, Toy Story 2 or WALL-E level excellence. The basic scenario of a teenager acting out against their overly-controlling, overly-protective parents is a very very familiar one. Bad parenting decisions remain a thing in Disney/Pixar, I see!
Also, the resulting plot is perhaps a little thin in real content, relying much more on clever action scenes and quick-fire comedy to keep things motoring along than any real depth of emotion. To be fair to the film-makers, they are smart enough to recognise that the film is best served by fast and snappy pacing: the movie definitely doesn't outstay its welcome, clocking in at a leanish hour-and-a-half.
To my mind, Brave is well worth seeing, but it's good-not-great, and unlikely to stay with you for a long time after its done.
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