Hello to everyone who has been following this blog for many years - I'm still blogging, I'm just moving over to https://www.claireheffer.com/blog - please continue to follow and let me take this opportunity to thank everyone who has been kind enough to visit over the years. May the lists continue...

Thursday, 22 October 2015



FILM 1390: INSIDE OUT

TRIVIA: According to director Pete Docter, each emotion is based on a shape: Joy is based on a star, Sadness is a teardrop, Anger is a fire brick, Fear is a raw nerve, and Disgust is broccoli. He noted that he likes broccoli very much, however.

Some of the memory balls in Riley's mind contain scenes from other Pixar movies, such as Carl and Ellie's wedding in Up (2009).

The writers considered up to 27 different emotions, but settled on five (Joy, Sadness, Disgust, Fear and Anger) to make it less complicated. Some of the major emotions that ended up being cut included Surprise, Pride, and Trust.

Psychologists and other experts were consulted so the writers could make the way Riley's mind works scientifically accurate. For example, it is believed that short-term memories made during the day are converted into long-term memories during sleep, which is what happens in Riley's mind.

In Riley's classroom (No. A113), a map at the back of the room has pins plotted at different places all over the world. They are references to where all the Pixar movies are set.

When Pete Docter and Jonas Rivera pitched the film to Mindy Kaling, she was moved to tears and said, "I think it's great that you guys are making a film that shows it's difficult to grow up and that it's okay to be sad about it." According to Pete Docter, they exclaimed, "Quick! Write that down!".

For the voice of toddler-age Riley, the producers simply recycled old dialogue of Mary Gibbs, who provided the voice of Boo in Monsters, Inc. (2001). She is even listed in the credits under additional voices.

"Yeast of Edin" is based on a bakery located near Pixar Studios. It only serves one kind of pizza each day, and broccoli is one of the toppings.

In the middle of the control console, the top three buttons form Mickey Mouse, otherwise known as a hidden Mickey.

PIZZA PLANET TRUCK: Director Pete Docter confirmed that the truck indeed appears at least three times in the film, but it is hard to find.

This film marks the fifteenth time John Ratzenberger has made an appearance in a Pixar film, and a second time as a construction worker. He also voiced a construction worker in Up (2009).

There is a scene in Dream Productions where a camera filter called the "reality distortion filter" is added. This is a direct reference to former Pixar CEO Steve Jobs, where he would do anything to convince his employees they could get the job done: they called it Steve's "reality distortion field."

The scene with the two guards discussing whose hat belongs to whom while guarding the Subconscious is a nod to the hat-swapping scene between Vladimir and Estragon from Samuel Beckett's play "Waiting for Godot".

Riley's classroom is No. A113., sharing the same number as the room at the California Institute of Arts where many animators, including John Lasseter and Brad Bird, graduated from. A113 is a common Easter egg in Pixar's films.

When Joy, Sadness and Bing Bong are in Cloudtown, A talking "memory cop" references Chinatown (1974) by saying, "Forget it Jake, it's Cloudtown".

The long-running British children's comic The Beano has, since the sixties, featured a strip called The Numskulls, which revolves around little people living inside a "real life" person, and being responsible for all his functions, both emotional and mechanical. After the release of Inside Out, The Beano issued a tongue-in-cheek reaction in which the Numskulls (inside their "host") watch the film and criticise it.

Both Riley's mother and father have brown eyes, but Riley has blue eyes. There is only a 25% chance that a baby will have blue eyes if both parents carry the recessive blue-eye gene. But if only one has a recessive blue-eye gene, and the other has two brown, dominant genes, then there is a less than 1% chance of the baby having blue eyes. Riley has her first memory shown in the film, so she was not adopted.

The memory balls are based on George Rhoads' "Kinetic ball sculptures"

One of the various aspects of Riley's mind that was cut from the film was a department called "Faces & Names". This was the department in charge of pairing up names of people Riley has met with their respective faces, but the leaders of either department dislike each other and do not speak (which explains the lapse in memory people get when they cannot remember someone's name).

As of Summer 2015, it holds the distinction of owning the largest opening weekend gross without taking the #1 spot on the box office charts. It took in a respectable $90 million its first weekend of release, falling short of the $106 million grossed by Jurassic World which set a new U.S. record the previous weekend with over $208 million in tickets sales.


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