Film Journal 2024: Inside Out 2

Film Journal 2024: Inside Out 2
Directed by Kelsey Mann

I’m glad I did a recent rewatch of the first film, and that I watched both films in essential succession this morning. I hadn’t actually revisited the first film since seeing it once in theaters back when it released, so I knew that a rewatch might bring some interesting and maybe suprising results. More importantly, it gave me a better gauge for which to make sense of my experience with both films as a seperate but also singular story.

Just to clear the air right up front, if you are stuck on begrudging this as a sequel, seeing it as emblematic of the larger problem plaguing both studios and theaters as they continue to doible down on familiar IP, that will likely define your experience of Inside Out 2. The simple fact that it is operating without the novelty of experiencing its inner world brought to life for the first time I think could feel like justification for resisting its existence.

In truth, I do think this fact forms what might be my biggest critique of the film, which is, by nature of contextualizing both stories into a narrow framework based on age and formation the sequel naturally condenses the reach of its message, both in its present context (puberty) and retrospectively (childhood). Of the two films the sequel suffers more, as I think the original has an already established legacy that applies its message and themes more universally as a concept. Similarly, the first film has the advantage of doing the leg work, which means it does the heavy lifting of parsing out the complexities of its vision and concept in ways the sequel doesn’t need to, leaving a fair portion of the sequel feeling a bit episodic in nature and even a little too on the nose.

It should also be noted though that the first film anticipates the sequel. It sets the stage for it, so to speak, and upon rewatch I think really does operate in faith of its eventual existence. This should help dispel some of those feelings about it being either unnecessary or simply a cash grab. And true to form, if  much of the film feels episodic, the recognizable and familiar Pixar “magic” shows up for the final act.

Thematically speaking the film continues where it left off, bringing in the new emotions that come along with puberty and, as the film posits it, the subsequent formation of the self. What’s interesting about the way the film navigates this is, the whole puberty aspect does tend to get left in the shadows the further the film gets into exploring its conception of the self. This is at least in part because the story is so contained and narrowed to its particular situation. I feel like it wanted the simplicity of its scenario driven plot (young girl going through puberty has a chance to discover her dream to be a hockey player at a time of personal transition) to afford it the freedom to then dig deeper into the bigger ideas it is exploring about the self, but there is a bit of a push and pull within the story between these two parallel lines that does end up feeling disjointed. To be fair, the plot of the first film is also far simpler than I remembered, but it had the freedom to commit more wholly and completely to the conceptualized inner workings of the emotional world precisely because it didn’t need to worry as much about the functional self. The natural progression of the sequel is towards bringing in that added dynamic of identity.

I remember when the first film came out that there was a plethora of think pieces dissecting the science of its premise, some supporting it and some criticizing it for pushing the science too far into the realm of ideology and transcendence. I also heard critiques about how it depicted emotions as seperate entities functioning in isolation. The sequel sort of addresses this in a round about way. It assumes the same fundamental end- happiness, or as some define it, happiness as the grounds of human flourishing, but it adds in a new emotion (anxiety) which has the power to bind all the others together. If happiness is the end, anxiety is the means that ensures it is attained. In the first film the story is about embracing sadness as a key to joy rather than its antithesis. In the sequel it is about embracing the whole as the true expression of the self.

Here is where things get really interesting however. The film roots the self in the notion of core beliefs. In theory, it is bringing together beliefs about the world and beliefs about the self, rooting in the natural outworking of puberty as the point in which we begin to build and formulate our identities in the face of these two interrelated realities. Not against our formative years, but in light of it. Beliefs here are seen to represent agency, toying with the question of whether our biology makes us who we are or if we (an operative self) determine our biological function. There is plenty there to parse out as far as reading between the lines in one direction or another, but suffice to say what it is teasing out along the way is the concept of a functional will.

I feel like the contained nature of the film does get tripped up here a bit, because it fails to leave room for wrestling with how past and future connect to the present. It seems to give in to the danger of allowing a point in time when the self generally sees itself as both conceptually autonomous and as the center of the world (puberty) to define the reality of the self in a more empirical and universal way. Its not difficult to look at the way the film conceptualizes beliefs and see that these beliefs are essentially constructs based on perceptual and conceptualized realities. This leaves the self as entity on shaky ground. And not only that, but these are constructs that are determined by external forces.

This left me thinking; why and how should we trust these core beliefs, especially when they appear to be operating in the form of concrete perceptions (I am a good person, for example). The film tries to weave into this a sentiment that sees us as the sum of both our good and bad parts, successes and failures, but this only works on a philopshical level if we make the necessary assumptions about the self that can and will allow us to function freely in the realm of perceptions.

That’s where the conception finds some challenges, most notably when it comes to bringing in a future perspective. If anxiety is about control of the future (or self control), then the future is about contending with life’s impact on our conception of the self. This seemed to me to be a missing piece of the puzzle for anyone trying to apply its concepts beyond puberty. The real question is, can the films construction of the self make sense of reality looking backwards, a notion that gets teased through a reoccurring gag throughout the film. Sure, it can speak to the perception that puberty affords it, but what happens when it is forced to contend for a different reality than our core beliefs assumed? What happens when reality threatens the legitimacy and trustworthiness of our perceptions?

I suppose one of the ways this film addresses this problem is by attempting to say that joy is not constrained to, confined to, or defined by our circumstance. It exists apart from it as a governing force over our lives, holding within it both our meaning and our purpose. There is, i think, fair and good truth here. But what is clear is that puberty perceives life according to its potential. It can feel what it does in the present because it believes there is a certain kind of future to be obtained in service of the self. It functions according to the belief that life has an aim, that progress has a shape, and that human flourishing is bound up in our happiness, or our experience of happiness.

Further, this is tied to our fundamental beliefs, structures that are built through our experiencing of the world. One of the lingering images in Inside Out 2 is of shattered beliefs being reconstructed in a way that pushes further and further out towards something transcendent. At the same time though its philosophy bleeds this transcendence back into its essential construct- the self. Even those things that see beyond ourselves are demonstrated to be part of our personhood, our identity.  So what would happen if a third film was made looking back at this person from the perspective of times passage? Would a meaningful life and true identity rest in proving this conception of personhood to be true? In experiences justifying our commitment to joy/happiness as worthwhile? Would our understanding of reality overturn our core beliefs once again, and if so in which direction and to what end? These are of course the sorts of existential questions that recast those fundamental constructs which hold together our sense of meaning and purpose and existence in a different light. I do wonder how the missing component of this story might or could work itself into the story’s we tell to this films target generation, a generation that finds its meaning in a given cultural expectation and norm.

If nothing else, this is the sort of conversation the film opens the door to, and that’s a testament to its strength. Its willingness to go big with its ideas is an admirable thing. And all the storytelling elements that made the first one a beloved classic- humor, character, emotion- are here, just in a slightly more streamlined and compartmentalized fashion. And as I mentioned, the third act finds a way to break the door wide open in this regard, so even if the bulk of this film isn’t operating quite on the same level as its predecessor, it’s defintiely worth the investment as a whole.