How the filmmakers of INSIDE OUT 2 made the climax of the film “authentic”

Published: June 18, 2024

How the filmmakers of INSIDE OUT 2 made the climax of the film seem “authentic”

By Movieguide® Contributor

“INSIDE OUT 2” director Kelsey Mann and producer Mark Neilsen said they had over 25 meetings with the cast and crew to make the film’s climax as realistic as possible.

“We had a gong from our visual effects supervisor [Sudeep Rangaswamy] “We called at the beginning and end of every meeting,” Mann told Variety. “It was a gathering of all the heads of the different departments to sort out the difficult things.”

“You want to make sure it feels real and authentic,” he continued. “To create a look that achieves that is really difficult. It took a lot of different departments working together to do it. And in the end, we got it right. Time was running out.”

“Simulation, effects, lighting and animation, all together, like, 'How do we do this?'” Neilsen added.

In the dramatic ending, now 13-year-old Riley's newest emotion, fear, takes over the control room after she is sent to the penalty box during the final game of a hockey camp. As the teenager's mind runs in circles, she suffers a full-blown anxiety attack.

“We started doing a lot of things like narrowing the shutter angle so that suddenly everything is much sharper and the focus becomes much deeper as Riley starts to put more and more pressure on herself,” said cinematographer Adam Habib. “Then, when the panic attack hits, we suddenly turn everything around. The focus becomes extremely shallow and the world disappears.”

“That moment in particular was interesting because we had talked about what if we made the background vibrate as Riley goes deeper and deeper into this panic attack?” added cinematographer Jonathan Pytko. “We heavily overexposed the light and really flooded that light that surrounds Riley as she goes through that moment. Then we added that [vibration] That's where it really became clear what happened.”

The scene's visual effects help viewers empathize with the terror of a panic attack, but the animation also captures the moments when Riley regains control as she learns to calm her emotions and overcome her fear. An excerpt from Movieguide®'s review states:

INSIDE OUT 2 is a wonderful, family-friendly animated film. The film is delightful, funny, imaginative and heartwarming. It contains many positive messages. For example, it encourages doing the right thing, controlling your emotions and not letting fear guide your decisions. INSIDE OUT 2 also promotes kindness, friendship, remorse and forgiveness. MOVIEGUIDE® advises caution with younger children as there are dangerous scenes and a large, scary but non-threatening character. Unlike other recent animated films, INSIDE OUT 2 does not contain any woke or politically correct content.

While Riley is able to overcome her fear, the moments of panic attacks are extremely difficult for Joy to deal with. Amy Poehler, who lends her voice to Joy, was able to empathize with her character particularly well in this moment because she understood that there was nothing she could do.

“That's a difficult thing when you don't know what to do as a parent when you're trying to help your child. If Riley is Joy's child, then Joy is wondering, 'What happened to my child?' Pixar is smart enough to let Joy take her foot off the gas, and by doing that and not pushing so much, Riley just calms herself down, and that's the hard lesson of growing up,” Poehler said.

Maya Hawke, who plays the anxiety disorder, believes this film will help young viewers.

“This generation of kids has been through the pandemic and everything else we've had to go through,” Hawke said. “They're dealing with a lot of anxiety, a lot of stress, a lot of social discomfort because they're having to learn to reunite their lives with other young people.”

“I think this film takes that seriously and expresses those feelings,” she added.

The film also teaches the audience that all emotions are necessary and have value at different times, an important lesson that both children and parents can take away from this film.

Fans are grateful for this message, as the film has already grossed $295 million worldwide in its debut weekend, including $155 million domestically and $140 million internationally.

Movieguide® previously reported:

INSIDE OUT 2's expert consultants reveal details about how they developed the film's plot and new characters, and why scares are actually “essential.”

“I'm a psychologist specializing in teenagers. I've written a lot about teenage girls,” explained psychologist and author Lisa Damour. “I saw drafts of the film and we offered advice on how to really make it consistent with the science. And they did an extraordinary job of that.”

Emotion researcher Dacher Keltner, professor of psychology at the University of California Berkeley and director of the Greater Good Science Center, added: “I thought [the moviemakers would] Are interested in strategic questions about film, [but] They are only interested in scientific questions, for example: How many emotions are there? What do they do to our brain? How do they influence our identity or our memory?”

The couple visited the Pixar lot, studied scenes from the film and sought advice on everything from facial expressions to what a person's voice should sound like when they're upset.

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