why I love pixar…
// July 26th, 2008 // 2 Comments » // Inspiration, Leadership, Megacentre, Movies
I took my son Joel to see Pixar’s latest creation, the unconventionally named WALL-E – about a little robot who is the only surviving robot of a whole fleet designed to clean up the Earth after centuries of rubbish build up. As is expected from such a movie – this accidental hero happens to inadvertently save the human race from growing fat out in space. Quite the topical issue for an America growing fatter by the year.
But thought provoking and meaningful sentiments aside – the movie is quite fun and as usual Pixar stretch the bounaries of CGI having already conquered the insect world (Bugs Life), the human world (Incredibles), the Undersea world (Finding Neo) – they can now add the weightless environment of outer space to their list of clever tricks.
Pixar is to CGI animated movies (that stands for Computer Generated Imagery for all the nerd newbys) what Disney was to the old paint and draw animated movies – the best! (One reason why Disney eventually bought Pixar for their own). There’s an similar passion to break the boundaries, to do something that others haven’t done, to conquer new environments and challenges.
But my real love of Pixar came from watching one of those special features that I found on the Monsters Inc DVD which I’d bought for my son. (There are benefits to being nerdy enough to watch the special features). It was a behind the scenes look at Pixar’s home base in Emeryville, California.
The most amazing thing I saw was not a tightly run, high pressured working environment where everyone existed to meet the next deadline and then go home – but a place where people came to play and not just do all of the latter. The truth is that most of these guys probably do spend their entire lives in and out of the studio, living under the pressure of huge deadlines and big budgets – so instead of living two seperate lives, they brought their lives and their creativity with them! From scooting down the halls, to the pet monkey, to the annual Paper Plane flying competition in the entrance foyer – these studios are a creative bubble of energy and passion all working together for the joy of making new movies.
This is not just a job to these guys – its a way of life for them and they’ve decided to make it an enjoyable one as well as a productive one. I guess thirteen Academy Awards, three Golden Globes, and one Grammy goes to show that their philosophy is certainly paying off!
Right now – we’re embarking on building a Megacentre in the heart of Leeds, following on from the awesome one we have in Sheffield – and I’m determined to above all make it a place where people love to be! It’s granted that some people are going to spend an awful lot of time in the new Megacentre making everything that needs to happen – happen! So I’m given to taking a leaf out of Pixar’s book and choose to bring my life with it… and build a place where people want to be – and more importantly – a place I want to be!
Too many churches feel like dead, stuffy old people’s homes with toilets you don’t want to go near and offices that are cluttered with rubbish and administration. Even the halls are posted from floor to ceiling in random notices, posters, flyers and useless pieces of information that no-one is ever going to read. Since when did you last visit someones home and as you walked into the front lounge there was a huge pinboard up on the wall telling you about where to get a coffee, or how much had been raised in the ‘by a new double bed’ fund and you would rather hold until later than visit the festering room called a ‘bathroom’ that stands at the top of the stairs, but smells from the bottom!
We need to make churches a place where people want to come and hang out – inject something of the coffee house culture into them so that when it comes to closing, you’re having to hang around until people finish because no-one is wanting to leave!
Surely the church of all places should be the most welcoming, the most homely, the most exciting and fun filled place to be. After all – it is the Father’s house… and the Father I know ain’t no stuffy fuddy duddy! He’s the most creative, awe-inspiring, and enthusiastic God you could ever know.
So I love pixar cause it has captured something of the way we are all supposed to live. In a creative, relationship based environment that pulls together, every person doing there bit, to see something amazing done on planet earth! The only difference is that what they do is temporal – but what we do is eternal.
I found the video on You Tube (in 3 parts) so here it is! I hope it inspires you in the same way it did me!
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Husband to the beautiful 
