Saw 2 flicks this past weekend, Cars (with the whole fambly of course) & A Prairie Home Companion (by myself).
Both recommendable. APHC is of course directed by Bob Altman, who I never miss; as the son of a midwestern Lutheran minister who has been a fan of the show from the beginning, I was really compelled to go. Garrison Keillor plays himself, as do a number of regular musicians & crew from the show. Woody Harrelson & John C. Reilly are very funny as Dusty & Lefty (billing themselves as 'The Old Trailhands'), Meryl Streep & Lilly Tomlin are the remaining sisters in what was once a quartet, and Streep's daughter is played by a surprisingly effective Lindsay Lohan. Kevin Kline, Virginia Madsen & Tommy Lee Jones also appear, but thier sub-plot is impossible to describe without spoilers. It was this element though that led me to comment to my dad that, to me at least, this felt much more like a Woody Allen movie than an Altman movie.
Cars is, I think, a very good movie, but some reviews are lukewarm & the one linked on the KBCO page is downright hostile. A very typical story arc, in fact the plot is lifted almost in one piece from Doc Hollywood, which was itself highly derivative. But the richness & detail of the animation is worth price of admission by itself, especially if you've ever been anywhere along the old Route 66. There are literally hundreds of visual references in the background. There is also one particular joke that evokes a bigger laugh than in any previous Pixar film, you'll know it when you hear it. And, finally, as in every previous Pixar film, John (Cliff Clavin) Ratzenberger has a role (as Mack the truck that hauls Lightning McQueen). Over the closing credits his character and others are shown watching movies at a drive-in. The movies are all remakes of earlier Pixar films fit into this Cars-are-People universe, and both the clips of the movies & Ratzenberger's comments are ROTFL funny.
