Onward and upward

I had my first moment of 2020 cinematic normalcy in almost a month Sunday afternoon when the family watched a bonafide A-list 2020 movie that had not yet come out in Australia. Onward was scheduled to hit theaters a couple Thursdays ago, but, well, we know what happened.

Of course, had it actually represented normalcy, I would have seen this in the theater. I haven't missed a Pixar movie in the theater the entire time I've been in Australia. Since then I've seen two Pixar movies that I didn't catch when they were in the theater -- Cars 2 and Monsters University -- but any film that was released theatrically after my August 2013 arrival, I saw in the theater. Yes, even The Good Dinosaur.

In fact, I had two chances to see Onward in the theater, both of which I had to pass up. I was invited to a press screening on a Sunday afternoon about a month ago, but we were already scheduled to go to my father-in-law's for lunch that day. (Plus, the screening was a rare admit two, meaning only one other family member could have attended with me. Usually they are admit four.) Then Hoyts was showing advanced screenings of Onward a week before its release, but by then, we had already decided I should stop going to movie theaters, a few days before they properly closed up shop.

But it felt good not to rely only on Netflix for new release content in March and April of 2020, as U.S. iTunes had the movie available to rent only a week after it was supposed to debut here. And now that means I can also review something that isn't just the latest thing Netflix has crapped out. (Actually, the first two Netflix movies I reviewed, The Platform and Uncorked, were not that at all. But Coffee & Kareem changed all that.)

I don't know exactly how many more 2020 movies there are that I care about seeing but haven't already seen, though I suppose pretty soon I'll be able to see marginal candidates like Bad Boys for Life, Sonic the Hedgehog and Call of the Wild. There's some more normalcy for you, maybe an extreme sort of normalcy.

I had heard mixed things about Onward -- two podcasters placed it in the lower half of their Pixar chart -- but I ended up being charmed and moved by it in equal measure. It had maybe a few pacing issues in the middle, but by the climax, my wife and I were both sniffling.

And then something equal parts moving and alarming happened. My nine-year-old son started bawling.

Not sniffling like we were. But crying the way he'd cry if he fell off a skateboard and took all the skin off his palms and knees.

It may just be that my son discovered, for the first time today, what it feels like when a movie makes you really sad.

Without spoiling the movie at all, I don't think Onward is particularly sad for a Pixar movie. As usual, they get the mix about right. And my older son has seen pretty much all those Pixar movies since we moved here with me. He didn't see Finding Dory, but so what.

I'd say its ending is about as emotional as the endings of Inside Out and Coco, which is high praise. He saw those movies, but he never reacted like this.

I suspect the pandemic has something to do with it. We are trying to protect them from the worst of the information about it, and they don't dwell on it much, hiding their fears if they have them at all. But we know they hear figures about deaths and other information that is, shall we say, dismaying. Fortunately, they are lucky enough not to know anyone who is directly affected, as are we.

But the themes of Onward, combined with the pandemic, likely opened the floodgates for the older one. It took us a couple minutes to calm him down.

Twenty minutes after it was over, he was once again bouncing around like a kid who had eaten too much sugar. So no permanent damage done.

But the loss presented in this film, even leavened by a perfect Pixar ending, was just too much for him. I get it.

So I guess it's onward and upward for him as a cinephile. He's had his first good cry at the movies. It only gets better from here.

My wife says she remembers him being similarly concerned by the fate of Bing Bong in Inside Out. But I don't really remember that, and besides, he was only four. As a nine-year-old, you know a lot more about the world, for better or for worse.

And with continued physical distancing and curve-flattening disruptions, maybe it will end up being for the better, and we can limit the catastrophic effect this virus has on the world.

I'd watch my next five Pixar movies on my home TV if we could collectively accomplish that.