I saw Brave tonight. Most of this is copy/pasted because I left a huge TL;DR comment on poor erethesunrises' journal.

The animation of course was gorgeous, especially Merida's hair. As someone with curly hair I particularly appreciated the way they animated Merida's wet hair -- IDK it is just very right for how wet curly hair looks so well done, Pixar.

I don't think it was Pixar's best nor Pixar's most original, but I think it was ultimately a really solid movie and I agree with a review I just read that said "its biggest weakness will be the fact that it is a story about women and relationships between women, and unfortunately it was made in a time when those stories are not valued as highly as those of men". I'm trying to think of another mother/daughter Disney movie and I honestly can't, though someone correct me if I'm wrong. To an extent we have mother/daughter in Tangled, but that's of course a very negative portrayal of an abusive relationship that is not redeemed in the end.

In terms of the basics of "parental conflict is resolved" I think the story was very basic, yeah. But I think being mother/daughter made a difference, and I did think the characters -- or at least Merida, Elinor and Fergus -- were richly established and that made all the difference. I mean, you KNOW "mend the bond broke by pride" or whatever is just going to mean 'Merida and Elinor kiss and make up', but I didn't think knowing that was coming took away from the story at all.

I had also been concerned that Elinor might come out too much like a villain, based on trailers, but in the movie I thought they did a very good job of portraying both Merida and Elinor fairly. I did love that scene where Merida tears the tapestry so Elinor burns her bow, but then plucks it out of the fire and cries. I thought it was powerful.

I thought the scene in the witch's house was a bit strange, could probably have been done better. It seemed brushed aside in order to get from A to B, though, and I can't say I mind because the movie really picks up after that.

I thought also that the climax really delivered -- as soon as we met the other bear I thought "okay, so Mama Bear is gonna come save Merida, right?" and when it didn't happen I was disappointed, but it was absolutely worth it for that scene in the climax. Merida fighting her dad and then bear!Elinor breaking free to save Merida was excellent and just idk very emotional, I thought. And so was the scene where Merida breaks down and apologizes.

My main criticism is that I think it lacked the clever humour that has become Pixar's trademark. One of the reasons so many Disney-Pixar movies appeal to ~all ages~ is that they manage to tap into a humour that appeals both to kids and to adults, and by that I don't mean the subtle sex jokes but just the cleverer things that kids won't have the context to recognize. Like, I don't know, the way Eve solves a Rubix cube in Wall-E. Brave didn't have as much humour and most of the humour it did have was more slapstick-y or bawdy -- the guys are naked, the guys flash each other, Fergus pinching Elinor's butt, Fergus knocks over the table, etc. None of that stuff bothered me except that it wasn't balanced out with an equal amount of "smarter" humour, which overall means the movie isn't likely to be one adults describe as "funny".

TL;DR I don't think the story was spectacularly original (and there's some discussion to be had there when you compare it to male-driven films like Up or Wall-E which are incredibly original, storywise) but I did think it was a very solid story, beautifully animated, and the bonus of it being about mothers and daughters gives it a thumbs up from me.

PS: It's interesting that the Pixar short in front of this mother-daughter movie was all about father-son relationships across generations. I literally just made that connection as someone reblogged a La Luna gif on Tumblr, and now I'm not sure what to make of it. Hmmmmmmm. (As for La Luna itself -- very pretty, but not my favourite.)