Inside Out 2 Filmmakers Dive Deeper into the World of Riley’s Mind and Hit the Ice in the Real World, discussing the balance in the film.
Inside Out 2: Balancing Riley’s Mind & the Real World
Filmmakers Dive Deeper into the World of Riley’s Mind and Hit the Ice in the Real World
Filmmakers ventured into creating the world of “Inside Out 2” with a bit of a blueprint given the world was established nine years ago in the first film. Says director Kelsey Mann, “This world is so much fun to play with because we can take concepts everyone knows and give them a visual form, which is awesome but also incredibly daunting—then and now. We thought it would be really fun to expand that world.”
The goal, of course, was to ensure audiences would recognize the setting while taking it to new levels. Says writer Dave Holstein, “The first movie was all about memories and we wanted to push the world further and deeper in the second. The idea of beliefs just felt like a natural progression for 13-year-old Riley. And what are beliefs made out of? How do they affect the mind? How do they form our Sense of Self? All those questions felt very emotionally rich.”
According to production designer Jason Deamer, the new film imagines what one’s belief system looks like.
“One of the things I appreciate the most about our studio is the willingness to evolve our films with the intent to make them the best they can possibly be,” says Deamer. “To accomplish what we had envisioned for the belief system, nine different departments came together to work on the same sequence at the same time. It was truly inspiring to be a part of such a large feat. The belief system is made with glowing translucent elements in a dark blue environment that’s so powerful – a delicate technical and creative balance. We wanted it to feel breathtaking when we go there; we wanted to create a sense of awe when the Emotions go there.”
Artists and technicians created other new arenas – places like the back of the mind, stream of consciousness and Imagination Land 2.0. “It’s like Imagination Land but dunked in all things growing up,” says Holstein.
The Real World
Riley is in for a whole new adventure in “Inside Out 2.” While San Francisco is still home to her and her family, the film ventures outside the city where Riley will play lots of hockey and juggle social interactions with new friends and old ones.
Once again, filmmakers had to differentiate the real world from the mind world. The goal? To ensure moviegoers would know instantly where they were. “The mind world,” says Deamer, “is pristine. Its materials are soft, translucent, colorful, and vibrant. The mind is world is clean. There’s no graffiti, no chipped paint, no worn surfaces in the mind. In the real world, it’s messy. The paint is dinged. The materials are more textural. In the real world, there’s bird poop and graffiti.”
According to executive producer Jonas Rivera, the first film used the environment to mimic what was going on in Riley’s life. “We sunk our teeth into those design elements and built a world that we felt echoed the story,” he says. “This time, Riley gets out of San Francisco. She’s literally out of her element. It’s meant to feel foreign and uncomfortable.
“Even in the mind world,” Rivera continues, “we push out of Headquarters, and we go farther – all the way to the back of the mind. Everything is changing both in Headquarters and beyond—everything’s unsettled. It’s like the whole thing’s under construction.”
NEXT: Inside Out 2 First 30 Minutes Description & Reaction
About Inside Out 2
The little voices inside Riley’s head know her inside and out—but next summer, everything changes when Disney and Pixar’s “Inside Out 2” introduces a new Emotion: Anxiety.
According to director Kelsey Mann, the new character promises to stir things up within headquarters. “Anxiety, voiced by Maya Hawke, might be new to the crew, but she’s not really the type to take a back seat,” said Mann. “That makes a lot of sense if you think about it in terms of what goes on inside all our minds.”
Disney and Pixar’s “Inside Out 2” returns to the mind of newly minted teenager Riley just as headquarters is undergoing a sudden demolition to make room for something entirely unexpected: new Emotions! Joy, Sadness, Anger, Fear and Disgust, who’ve long been running a successful operation by all accounts, aren’t sure how to feel when Anxiety shows up. And it looks like she’s not alone.
Maya Hawke lends her voice to Anxiety, alongside Amy Poehler as Joy, Phyllis Smith as Sadness, Lewis Black as Anger, Tony Hale as Fear, and Liza Lapira as Disgust. Directed by Kelsey Mann and produced by Mark Nielsen
