“Inside Out 2” Canadian Artists on Hockey Scenes, Teen Anxiety and Emotion Making the Film

When the first Upside down The film was released in 2015, the Pixar film was deeply moving for many people in the audience. Now Amy Poehler and Lewis Black are back to voice their animated characters Joy and Anger in Inside Out 2starring Maya Hawke as Anxiety and Ayo Edebiri as Envy, exploring new emotions with 13-year-old Riley (voiced by Kensington Tallman).

Canada should be particularly proud of Inside Out 2 with a number of Canadian artists responsible for the creation of this animated film. For story supervisor John Hoffman, of Calgary, Alberta, there was a specific Canadian touch to Inside Out 2 it meant a lot to him.

“Being that I'm Canadian and I draw characters playing hockey, I never thought I could do that in an animated film,” Hoffman said. Yahoo Canada. “The fact that I was able to do that was pretty cool. … I'm very lucky.”

New emotions in 'Inside Out 2'

In Inside Out 2Hockey-loving Riley has entered early adolescence and puberty, which means new emotions have arrived at headquarters: anxiety (Hawke), envy (Edebiri), boredom ( Adèle Exarchopoulos) and embarrassment (Paul Walter Hauser).

Hoffman revealed that there were a few other emotions that could have been included in Inside Out 2but were ultimately put aside.

“I think there were four other emotions that were part of the movie in an early, much older version that we ended up cutting,” Hoffman said. “Some of them were like, 'Oh, that's a really funny joke, but we literally have nothing else to do with this character'…maybe to serve the story we need to get rid of them.”

“So it was just about finding the right emotions for teenage Riley, in that moment, that would be most helpful in telling the story we wanted to tell.”

Inside Out 2 is also the first Pixar project with a predominantly female story team, which story artist Rebecca McVeigh (of Toronto) described as a “blessing” to be part of this film.

“One of my favorite memories working on the film was [when] Myself and a group of other women, not just in history, but across departments, we all sat in a room and just talked about what we remembered from when we were 13, and it “It was pretty crazy,” Mcveigh said. “There were so many similarities. »

“There were a few notes that we kept going over and I think as we did that we kind of realized, oh, these are things that we could talk about and that everyone would understand. It was pretty amazing that not only… did the women in the room feel a deep connection to this film, but I was… happy that all the men understood it too… I think teenagers are going through something, that transition from 12 to 13 is just so powerful, and it really seems to stick in people's minds, they have a very strong reaction to any type of storytelling at that time.

Anxiety was an emotion that Mcveigh found particularly “liberating” to explore in this film.

“I think it was actually surprisingly fun to try to revisit the emotions of a 13-year-old, and anxiety was definitely a big part of my 13-year-old self,” Mcveigh said.

“I found myself suffocated when I was drawing”

The original Upside down has a reputation for being a particularly impactful tearjerker, opening a window into the emotions felt by each viewer, and Inside Out 2 had a similar impact for the team working on this new film.

“We heard a lot of stories about how the first one ended up helping people communicate with their children, and the children [being able] to talk about the emotions they felt because of what the first movie did,” Hoffman pointed out.

“What I noticed in this movie that I didn't necessarily notice in the others was that I felt stifled when I was drawing certain things and certain moments. And I was kind of like, 'OK , it's interesting. It didn't happen.” before, I think we could exploit something. And then it's about finding that little spark of emotion that you feel when you draw it, and then trying to navigate it all the way through. throughout the filmmaking process so that we could land it and integrate it into the film.”

Upside down quickly became part of the movement to make animated films that could connect with both children and adults through particularly resonant and robust storytelling, which continued during the creation of the second film.

“Honestly, the fact that we make children's films isn't really talked about, we just want to be entertained,” Mcveigh said. “I think if you know you can make a film that resonates with you, you can expect it to resonate with other people.”

“So we're making films for the general public in the truest sense of the word. I want everyone to be able to watch this film and understand the emotion that goes through it, whether it's a man in his 90s or 10 years.”