Reviews - Monsters, Inc. (2001)

User Score

Based on 626 075 Ratings

Your Score

0 out of 10

Rate this:

Monsters, Inc. (2001)

Genres: Animation, Adventure, Comedy

Taglines: You Won't Believe Your Eye.

Director: Pete Docter, David Silverman, Lee Unkrich

Writers: Pete Docter, Jill Culton, Jeff Pidgeon, Ralph Eggleston, ...

Stars: John Goodman, Billy Crystal, Mary Gibbs, Steve Buscemi, ...

A city of monsters with no humans called Monstropolis centers around the city's power company, Monsters, Inc. The lovable, confident, tough, furry blue behemoth-like giant monster named James P. Sullivan (better known as Sulley) and his wisecracking best friend, short, green cyclops monster Mike Wazowski, discover what happens when the real world interacts with theirs in the form of a 2-year-old baby girl dubbed "Boo," who accidentally sneaks into the monster world with Sulley one night. And now it's up to Sulley and Mike to send Boo back in her door before anybody finds out, especially two evil villains such as Sulley's main rival as a scarer, chameleon-like Randall (a monster that Boo is very afraid of), who possesses the ability to change the color of his skin, and Mike and Sulley's boss Mr. Waternoose, the chairman and chief executive officer of Monsters, Inc.

100 | Robert Wilonsky

As giddy and antic as any great Warner Bros. cartoon of the 1930s and '40s -- it bears seeing more than once, if only to allow for the sight gags that play second fiddle to the plot, a rarity in animation -- but also resonant and real. In other words, it's the perfect movie.

100 | Peter Travers

It's the Pixar animators who keep grown-ups as riveted as the kids with visual marvels that dazzle and delight.

100 | Hazel-Dawn Dumpert

The story's charming, the set pieces are wildly inventive, and even the throwaway one-liners, about everything from movie-animation pioneer Ray Harryhausen to the old Oscar Meyer jingle, are hilarious.

90

A terrific piece of work: smart, inventive and executed with state-of-the-art finesse.

90 | A.O. Scott

There hasn't been a film in years to use creative energy as efficiently as Monsters, Inc.

88 | Lawrence Toppman

It comes from Pixar, the animation studio that scored with the "Toy Story" series and "A Bug's Life," and it has more zip and a tad less soul than those predecessors.

88 | Mark Caro

The climax, featuring what's essentially a suspended roller coaster of closet doors, is as thrilling as it is imaginative.

88 | Rene Rodriguez

Movies like Monsters, Inc. literally make you feel like a kid again, marveling at the joyously inventive sights before you, and that's a feat that should not be taken lightly.

88 | Carrie Rickey

"Shrek" is a scintilla funnier, "Toy Story 2" a hair's breadth more poignant, but "MI" is every bit as imaginative and lovable as these other contemporary animation classics.

88 | Lou Lumenick

Smart, funny and ingeniously detailed with terrific vocal teamwork.

88 | Mike Clark

Though the comedy is sometimes more frenetic than inspired and viewer emotions are rarely touched to any notable degree, the movie is as visually inventive as its Pixar predecessors.

83 | William Arnold

Not quite up to the exalted level of the two predecessors ("Toy Story" and "Toy Story 2"), be assured it's still the most eye-popping and thoroughly entertaining animated film to come down the pike so far this year.

80 | Michael Dequina

Confirms that despite all the technical tools at their disposal, one thing counts head and shoulders above razzle-dazzle eye candy (or anything else, for that matter): the story and characters, and Monsters, Inc. introduces worthy additions to the Pixar pantheon.

80 | Peter Rainer

Much more kid-oriented than any other computer-animated movie thus far. In other words, it's much more Disneyish. I enjoyed it.

80 | Lisa Alspector

An unprecedented friendship between a monster and a child leads to an amazing chase scene.

78 | Marc Savlov

The spirited interplay between Goodman and Crystal is both wacky and, dare I say, charming.

75 | David Sterritt

The movie's cutest twist is that the monsters are more scared of kids than kids are of them, because they think human children are toxic.

75 | Carla Meyer

Funny and sweet enough to delight kids and inventive enough to satisfy adults.

75 | Lisa Schwarzbaum

Monsters, Inc. has got that swing, that zippity, multilevel awareness of kids'-eye sensibilities and adult-pitched humor.

75 | Roger Ebert

Monsters, Inc. is cheerful, high-energy fun, and like the other Pixar movies, has a running supply of gags and references aimed at grownups.

70 | Charles Taylor

It's a nice movie. But Disney has never learned that "nice," especially in comedy, is a negative virtue.

70 | Todd McCarthy

Clever and jokey in a vaudeville sort of way, but lacks the heart and sheer imagination of the company's best work for Disney, "Toy Story 2" and "A Bug's Life."

70 | David Edelstein

Doesn’t have the warmth of the Toy Story pictures, but it still boasts a very entertaining slapstick-farce structure and some neat hairy, oozy, tendrilly creatures.

60 | Kenneth Turan

Though it has its charms, Monsters, Inc. does not measure up. As a childhood entertainment it is certainly fine, but Pixar's celebrated lure for adults is largely absent.

60 | Frank Lovece

The funny lines fall flat and the relationships and conversations among adult characters are straight out of 1950s sitcoms. Now that's scary.

50 | Michael Atkinson

But Monsters, Inc. -- directed by Pixar soldier Pete Docter, not by master digital comic John Lasseter -- turns out to be stingy on context, commentary, and the prism-ing view of pop culture that made the earlier films mint.