Margie and I have been real slugs when it comes to movies, especially over the past few years. Which is why the two big animated features of last year -- Shrek and Monsters, Inc. -- went unseen until they came out on DVD. Having now (the latter last night) seen both, all I have to say is ...

... well, wow, because that computer animation gets more and more impressive each time something new comes out. And ...

... Monsters, Inc., by a length.

Don't get me wrong. Shrek isn't a bad movie by any means. It's funny. It's cute. It's imaginative. It's even got a good lesson.

One of Shrek's weaknesses, though, is its strengths: Eddie Murphy. Shrek comes across as an Eddie Murphy vehicle (overwhelming both John Lithgow and Mike Myers), and even though I like Murphy in small doses, when I look back on the movie, it's his nattering and jiving away that I remember.

Monsters, Inc. could have had the same problem, but Billy Crystal's character doesn't overwhelm the screen (for all the nattering that he does). And, frankly, I was so charmed by Boo that I could have just seen a movie with her in it. In concept, imagination, and (ironically) the sheer humanity of the lead characters (particularly John Goodman's Sully), Monsters, Inc. is a must-see for anyone -- and that doesn't even include the mandatory need for anyone who has, or knows someone who has, a 2-3-year-old to see this flick. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll just feel good.

We will be picking up our copy post-haste.

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I completely agree. Shrek was too...icky. And I hates that donkey.

Monsters was fun and original and could you believe the way Sully's fur moved when he walked?!?! I was goose-bumpy. And the short at the beginning, For the Birds, hands down the funniest thing I've seen in years.

Dude, you should sign up with Blogcritics.org and post this review over there as well.

Thanks, Stacy.

So ... since there's no "sign up here!" button on the site, do I just contact the editor/administrator?

We finally saw Monsters Inc this weekend too. I agree on all counts, especially Boo. We decided that she was Will with pigtails. Watched it twice, once to "preview it" (umm, yeah, that's our story...) and the second time with Will. He enjoyed it, especially when Boo talked or laughed - I think it was the fact that someone spoke his language.

Showing the film to Katherine is high on our list of things to do once we get it.

Dave, can you get to the site right now?? Must be a router down between here and there... Just email Eric and tell him you want in.

I was just talking about Monsters and Shrek with someone at lunch today. I liked Shrek, but I think one of the things that make it miss is its Herculean effort to be "realistic." So much effort is put into the backgrounds, when you see the princess for example and she doesn't look absolutely "real," the spell is broken. Consistency is what I guess I'm getting at. With Monsters, they created a totally consistent alternate universe, so you got lost in it. In Shrek I just didn't.

Hmmm. Interesting.

Extending that a bit further, I would argue that most of the humor in Monsters, Inc., is in the service of the story. It tells you something about the world the film is in. It fleshes things out. Whereas Shrek included quite a few bits that, in retrospect, seem to be of the "Hey, wouldn't it be cool if we tossed this in there?" nature?

Again, not bad per se, but it made it less of an organic whole than MI.

I'm not a big fan of either movie, CGI effects aside. But the full price of tickets and popcorn was repaid in my 3-1/2-year-old's response after I took her and her sister to see Monsters, Inc.

"Daddy," she howled, "that was a bad movie! It had monsters in it!"