Red Earthquake: Pixar's "Red Fire" is an instant and groundbreaking classic

"Red Fire" is Pixar's first feature film directed by a woman, but that's not the end of the history and hysteria.

Watching it reveals that the result is also groundbreaking on other fronts, and it deserves to be considered an instant classic

Avner Shavit

12/03/2022

Saturday, 12 March 2022, 22:27 Updated: 22:50

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Trailer for the movie "Red Fire" (Film Forum)

Star rating for movies - 4 stars (Photo: image processing,.)

In 1995, Pixar Studios changed the world of animation and Hollywood in general when they released their first feature-length film, Toy Story.

Directed by the same man, and the same was true of all the films that followed.

Brenda Chapman almost fixed it and set a milestone about a decade ago, but she was fired from "Brave" in the middle of the production.

Only now, 27 years and 24 films after "Toy Story," is Pixar's first feature-length film signed by a director from the beginning to the end of the road.

"Red Fire" was his name, and it was directed by Domi Shai.

The filmmaker was born in China, and at the age of two moved with her family to Canada and settled there.

This biography is reflected in her work - in her short and Oscar-winning film "Come", which was screened before "Super-Family 2" four years ago;

And in this movie too.

"Red Fire," "Turning Red" in its original and less enthusiastic name, follows Mae, a 13-year-old girl from Toronto who comes from her Chinese family.

Like many immigrant families, hers is torn between tradition and assimilation, and is characterized by an ambition that pushes the protagonist to achievement and excellence.

All of this, in addition to the routine tensions of adolescence, creates an inner burn within her that eventually explodes metaphorically and literally as she looks in the mirror and discovers that she has become a huge red panda.

Mae responds to this hysterically, but then it turns out to be a natural process: this transformation in turn befell each of her family members.

Tradition dictates that at some point in her life, each of them will temporarily become a panda.

The question is just how long it will happen, how you will control it and whether it is a curse or a blessing.

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Skill of an adolescent panda.

From "Red Fire" (Photo: Film Forum)

Stories of physical transformation are a familiar plot pattern - from Kafka's "incarnation", through superheroes like the green giant to teen movies like "Young Wolf", a declared source of inspiration for "Red Fire".

The difference is that all of these dealt with men, and here the point of view is different and the context is different.

Usually, cinematic pandas are in black and white, so why a red panda?

Because the subtext of the film is, among other things, the female cycle, and red symbolizes it.

The script uses a few more corny templates.

The leading obsession of the protagonist and her friends is a boy band, and her great ambition - to attend her performance.

The mother of the teenage girl, who opposes almost every initiative of hers, strongly opposes this idea as well, which creates further tension between them.

Conflict between girls and mothers over a desire to go for such a pastime has already starred in a classic episode of "Roseanne" and most recently in "Preparatory Day", for example, but "Red Fire" is educated to present it in an original and creative way.

In general, "Red Fire" is full of ideas like a pomegranate.

In Israel, the film went to theaters, but in America it went directly to Disney Plus, the streaming service that is not yet available in Israel.

I took advantage of this to watch it twice in a row, and even in double viewing it is not easy to exhaust all the congestion it has.

The plot skeleton here is relatively simple: unlike many other Pixar films, the characters here do not necessarily move between worlds.

But despite this, the film is educated to deal with an almost endless amount of tension: between what we internalize and what we externalize;

Between childhood and adolescence;

Between East and West;

And between different generations of the same family.

It also describes how all of these conflicts fit together, and how gender identity is reflected and integrated into ethnic identity.

Red Toronto.

From "Red Fire" (Photo: Film Forum)

As usual nowadays, the distribution of the film is accompanied by various scandals and testimonies from Pixar employees that the studio censors "LGBT content", and on the other end of the spectrum - a censor of negative criticism of the film, which was published on a popular American website and denounced as "racist" and "sexist" Because he claimed he was "too specific and would only interest the Asian Asian community in Toronto.

" .

"Red Fire" may draw from the Chinese tradition and is laden with specific details, but what's wrong with that?

It just makes it richer and more fascinating.

In addition, it also has a universal dimension.

Like many great films, its power in its specificity and its power in its universality.

Specifically, "Red Fire" could easily have been a Jewish story.

It has all the relevant elements - a family that immigrated to North America and is torn between progress and tradition, dominant mothers and a character who undergoes a puberty ceremony at the age of 13. On the other hand, because of his engagement he also corresponds with the ultimate Jewish youth book, I'm Margaret "by Judy Bloom.

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You can also watch a movie about a bar or bat mitzvah.

From "Red Fire" (Photo: Film Forum)

For the benefit of the bar and bat mitzvah boys and girls, we are told that in Israel the film also comes out in a dubbed version, in which Meshi Kleinstein speaks in the heroine's voice.

Originally starring, among others, Rosalie Chiang, Sandra O, and Maitrei Remakrishnan, which broke out in "Truth or Duty," a series that also has little in common with "Red Fire."

At least in the American version, the dubbing works do not leave a special impression.

The animation is not exactly intoxicating either, and there is no joke here that will make the audience grab the belly, or a moment of transcendence that will make them shed tears.

To win a "fire red" it will be said that there is no manipulative second in it.

He does not try to play with the feelings of the viewers, nor does he need it.

The film is so clever, brilliant and relevant that the result manages to excite even without playing games and pressing buttons.

In conclusion, "Red Fire" is suitable for every distribution and every age, and deserves to enter the Pantheon as an immediate classic, which will be taught in future generations.

On a personal note, turning it into a cult will serve another interest - its Hebrew translation could inspire headlines in the sports sections after every Hapoel derby victory.

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• Pixar

• Silk Kleinstein