Amusement Parks & Family Entertainment Amusement Parks

Visually, A Bug’s Life shows a lot more color than Antz.
© Disney Enterprises, Inc./Pixar Animation Studios. All Rights Reserved.
mation alone is strong enough to
carry the story. The rapid-fire gags,
brightly colored visuals and constant
movement in some scenes
gets a bit overwhelming. Every syllable
every characters utters is
accompanied by a gesture or a
change of expression; sometimes
it’s enough for a character to stand
quietly and say what he has to.
The breakneck comic chase at the
end, with its swooping camera
moves and MTV-style editing, goes
on too long and wears out its welcome.
These minor flaws aside, A
Bug’s Life is a clever, enormously
entertaining film that has “hit” written
all over it. This round of the
Disney vs. DreamWorks duel goes
to Disney — and PIXAR — for a
technical knock-out.
Charles Solomon is an internationally
respected critic and historian
of animation. His most
recent books include The Disney
That Never Was (Hyperion,
1995), Les Pionniers du Dessin
Animé Américain (Dreamland,
Paris, 1996), Enchanted Drawings:
The History of Animation
(Knopf, 1989; reprinted, Wings,
1994) and The Prince of Egypt: A
New Vision in Animation
(Abrams, 1998). His writings on
the subject have appeared in TV
Guide, Rolling Stone, the Los
Angeles Times, Modern Maturity,
Film Comment, the Hollywood
Reporter, Millimeter, the Manchester
Guardian, and been
reprinted in newspapers and professional
journals in the United
States, Canada, France, Russia,
Britain, Israel, the Netherlands
and Japan.
Note: Readers may contact any
Animation World Magazine contributor
by sending an e-mail to
editor@awn.com.
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ANIMATION WORLD MAGAZINE December 1998 48