Inside Out 2

1hr 36mins (U)

It’s been nine years since Pixar released its hit animation Inside Out, but this sequel has been worth the wait. Even “funnier, cleverer and more awesomely inventive” than the original, it marks a “triumphant return to form for the studio behind Toy Story and Up”, said Larushka Ivan-Zadeh in the Daily Mail. Like the original, the film mostly takes place inside the mind of Riley (Kensington Tallman), a young girl living in San Francisco “whose inner HQ is controlled by personified emotions, led by the super-perky Joy (Amy Poehler)”. But two years have passed, and Riley is now turning 13, at which point she morphs into a “pimply” and obstreperous adolescent, and a gang of new emotions turn up to guide her actions. They include Envy, Embarrassment, Anxiety and even Ennui, voiced by the French actress Adèle Exarchopoulos. Parts of the film will “whizz over pre-pubescent heads”, but in an era of “churned-out, dumbed-down content, the level of sophistication” is admirable; and the film might even offer a dollop of comfort to “today’s anxiety-riddled youngsters”.

It doesn’t pull it all off, said Jonathan Dean in The Sunday Times: there are too many characters, and there isn’t enough in the film “to surprise us”. But the “writing is smart, tender and knowing”, and serious subjects such as bullying are handled with an appealingly light touch. Directed by Kelsey Mann, Inside Out 2 “glimmers with diamond-hard truths about the complex business” of being a teenager, said Nicholas Barber on BBC Culture. It also manages to be “a fast-paced and playful comedy adventure”. Even so, as Riley struggles with an identity crisis, the film can get a bit stressful. If there is a sequel, “it would be nice if Contentment” joined the cast.