Cars 2

""Going where no car has gone before.""

—Tagline, [[{{{3}}}]]

Cars 2 is a movie in the Cars series and the sequel of Cars.

Plot

The film begins with British spy car Finn McMissile sneaking into a suspicious oil platform and find that evil scientist Professor Z is in command of the operations there, but he is discovered and is forced to escape without getting enough info about the Professor's schemes. Meanwhile, after winning the Piston Cup for the fourth time, racecar Lightning McQueen returns to Radiator Springs and rejoins his best friend tow truck Mater.

While watching the announcement of the first World Grand Prix sponsored by former oil tycoon Miles Axlerod to promote his new renewable fuel, Allinol, Mater gets angry when F1 car Francesco Bernoulli starts boasting about how he is far faster than McQueen and he manages to contact the TV studio by phone to confront him. McQueen intervenes and accepts Bernoulli's challenge to race against him into the Grand Prix.

By suggestion of McQueen's girlfriend Sally Carrera, Mater travels with him to Tokyo, Japan to the first race of the Grand Prix, but McQueen is worried if Mater could manage to behave properly. His fears are confirmed when Mater creates a series of ruckus in the debut party. While going to the bathroom, Mater comes across two thugs confronting an American secret agent named Rod "Torque" Redline, who slips a device containing classified info into his body without him noticing, and is approached by McMissile's assistant, Holley Shiftwell who mistakes him for the agent and they agree to meet during the race in the following day. Rod Redline is then captured and brought to Professor Z who reveals that cars fueled with Allinol explode when exposed to a high level of radiation. He makes a demonstration on the agent himself after figuring that Mater has the info and orders his men to capture him.

The race in Tokyo begins and Bernoulli soon takes the lead until he is surpassed by McQueen. Z's agents make use of a radiation beam disguised as a camera to ignite the Allinol in some competitors, leading to some accidents. McMissile and Shiftwell find that the agents are coming after Mater and manage to have him flee to the streets by hacking the transmitter he is using to pass instructions to McQueen, which ends up having McQueen surrendering the lead to Bernoulli by mistake. McMissile manages to save Mater from his pursuers, but McQueen blames Mater for losing the race and claims that he does not need his help anymore. Saddened for having his best friend angry on him, Mater leaves to the airport to take a plane home but once again he is pursued by the Professor's thugs just to be rescued in time by McMissile. Still mistaking him for a secret agent, McMissile and Shiftwell ask Mater to help them thwart Z's plans.

In Porto Corsa, Italy, where the second leg of the Grand Prix is being held, Mater manages to infiltrate one of the criminals' meetings disguised as another tow truck. He finds that the mysterious chain of accidents occurring during the races is part of a plan to discredit the Allinol and ensure that all cars keep using conventional fuel to secure the profits of their organization who managed to secure the largest unexplored oil resources in the world.

With most cars out of the race due to the explosions, McQueen and Bernoulli end up in first and second respectively. Miles Axlerod states that with the Allinol under suspicion he decides to suspend use of the fuel for the third and final leg in the UK, but McQueen states that he trusts Axlerod's fuel (by Fillmore's advice) and will keep using it. The criminals then decide to have McQueen killed in the next race. Mater reveals himself by accident and rushes to warn his friend, but is captured along McMissile and Shiftwell before being able to do so.

Mater wakes up tied up in London inside Big Bentley with McMissile and Shiftwell, also tied up, minutes away from being crushed by its gears. The last race begins and the criminals use the radiation device on McQueen, but surprisingly, nothing happens. Mater learns that a bomb was put into Lightning's pit crew area, set to explode when McQueen stops there, and Mater manages to escape to warn his friends. McMissile and Shiftwell succeed in freeing themselves as well, but find that the bomb is actually on Mater, swapped with his air filter. They warn him about the bomb just when he is about to rejoin the others, and Mater flees to protect them, with McQueen going after him unaware of the situation.

Professor Z tries to detonate the bomb remotely only to find that the device is out of the signal's range. He then orders his thugs to corner Mater with his friends to have them explode together, but the army and the police (helped by Sheriff and Sarge) intervene and have him arrested. McMissile orders Zündapp to deactivate the bomb on Mater but he claims that only the one who installed it is able to do so. Mater then figures out that the true mastermind behind the criminals is no other than Sir Axlerod himself whose aim was to have the world relinquish the use of all alternative fuels in favor of the oil reserves in his possession. Axlerod ends up confirming Mater's suspicion when he is confronted by him and forced to deactivate the bomb with a voice command to prevent it from killing everyone.

For stopping Axlerod's plans, Mater is knighted by the Queen and returns home with his friends where the cars from the Grand Prix take part into their own, unofficial Radiator Springs Grand Prix. Fillmore reveals that Sarge replaced McQueen's Allinol before the last race with his own organic fuel mixture, which is what prevented Lightning from being affected by the radiation. McMissile and Shiftwell pay a visit to Mater and invite him to join them in another secret mission, but he declines, claiming that he is in the place he should be.

During the credits, Lightning McQueen and Mater are shown to be driving through various locations around the world before finally returning to Radiator Springs.

Cast

Character	Voice Actor
Mater	Larry the Cable Guy
Lightning McQueen	Owen Wilson
Finn McMissile	Michael Caine
Holley Shiftwell	Emily Mortimer
Sir Miles Axlerod	Eddie Izzard
Francesco Bernoulli	John Turturro
Brent Mustangburger	Brent Musburger
Grem	Joe Mantegna
Professor Z	Thomas Kretschmann
Acer	Peter Jacobson
Sally	Bonnie Hunt
Darrell Cartrip	Darrell Waltrip
Uncle Topolino	Franco Nero
David Hobbscap	David Hobbs
Luigi	Tony Shalhoub
Otis	Jeff Garlin
Tomber	Michel Michelis
Siddeley & Leland Turbo	Jason Isaacs
Fillmore & Combat Ship	Lloyd Sherr
Rod "Torque" Redline	Bruce Campbell
Mater's Computer	Teresa Gallagher
Flo	Jenifer Lewis
Victor Hugo	Stanley Townsend
Vladimir Trunkov	Stanley Townsend
Alexander Hugo	Velibor Topic
Crabby	Sig Hansen
Guido	Guido Quaroni
The Queen & Mama Topolino	Vanessa Redgrave
Ivan the Tow Truck	Stanley Townsend
J. Curby Gremlin	John Mainieri
Tubbs Pacer	Brad Lewis
Ramone	Cheech Marin
Jeff Gorvette	Jeff Gordon
Lewis Hamilton	Lewis Hamilton
Sarge	Paul Dooley
Minny	Edie McClurg
Van	Richard Kind
Lizzie	Katherine Helmond
Mack	John Ratzenberger
Sheriff	Michael Wallis
Mel Dorado	Patrick Walker
Additional Voices	Jess Harnell
Additional Voices	Junichi Kajioka
Chuki	Sonoko Konishi
Carla Veloso	Barbara Kottmeier
John Lassetire	John Lasseter
Additional Voices	Colleen O' Shaughnessey
Additional Voices	Daniel Okeefe

Three voice actors of the original Cars have also died since the first film had been released. Joe Ranft, who voiced Red and Jerry Recycled Batteries, died in a car accident in August 2005 during production of the first film. Red appears in the movie and does an inaudible cry.

George Carlin, who voiced Fillmore, died of heart failure in June 2008. Lloyd Sherr will provide the voice of Fillmore in the film.

Paul Newman, who voiced Doc Hudson, died in September 2008 after losing an ongoing cancer battle. Lasseter was at first adamant that Newman would return, even though he had announced his retirement from acting. After Newman's death, Lasseter said that they would see how the story goes with Doc Hudson. Finally, it was chosen that Doc wouldn't be voiced by another actor in the movie, instead they made it where he would be deceased.

In international versions of Cars 2, Jeff Gorvette is replaced in one scene by a different character, voiced by a regionally better known racer than Jeff Gordon:

Australia: Mark Winterbottom: Mark "Frosty" Winterbottom
Spain: Fernando Alonso: Fernando Alonso
Russia: Vitaly Petrov: Vitaly Petrov
Sweden: Jan Nilsson: Jan "Flash" Nilsson
China: Unknown: Long Ge
Mexico: Memo Rojas, Jr.: Memo Rojas, Jr.
Germany: Sebastian Vettel: Sebastian Schnell (Max Schnell)
Brazil: Claudia Leitte: Carla Veloso
France: Unknown: Raoul ÇaRoule

Notable voices in the international versions are Sophia Loren, who voices Mama Topolino in 21 non-English countries, and Jacques Villeneuve, who voices David Hobbscap in the French versions. In the Brazilian version, sportspeople still appear, with Lewis Hamilton becoming Formula One champion Emerson Fittipaldi, while Brent Mustangburger and David Hobbscap were done by sports announcers José Trajano and Luciano do Valle.

Production

It is released in Disney Digital 3-D, IMAX 3D, RealD 3D and 2-D.

Development

Cars 2 was originally scheduled for a 2012 release, but Pixar moved the release up a year, on June 24, 2011 in the United States, and July 22, 2011 in the United Kingdom.

A storyboarded scene which was used during the production of the movie

John Lasseter conceived the sequel's story while traveling around the world promoting the first film. He said, "I kept looking out thinking, 'What would Mater do in this situation,' you know? I could imagine him driving around on the wrong side of the road in the UK, going around in big, giant traveling circles in Paris, on the autobahn in Germany, dealing with the motor scooters in Italy, trying to figure out road signs in Japan."

The spy theme of Cars 2 emerged from a scene developed for Cars, which would have seen Lightning and Sally go to the drive-in movie theater, where they would have seen a spy film. Although the scene didn't make it to the final film, John Lasseter, who says to be an avid spy films fan, liked so much the idea of spy cars that he kept it in mind and it became a main element in Cars 2.

From left to right: Denise Ream (producer), John Lasseter (director), Emily Mortimer (Holley Shiftwell), Larry the Cable Guy (Mater) & Michael Giacchino (composer)

Several members of the team watched spy movies and studied the scenarist techniques and filming process. Lasseter watched as many spy movies as he could get to figure out the genre. While looking at spy films, story supervisor Nathan Stanton payed particular attention to how car chases are shot.

Some members of the Cars 2 production team made a research trip in Europe in May 2009 were they visited 15 locations in 12 days. They also got to Japan in October 2009.

Many animators had the opportunity to test real sports cars at their full speed, by themselves or with a pilot, to gain experience on how to animate the characters of the movie. Some also attended to racing events.

It took a long time for the team to decide of the emotional center of the film. Notably Doc Hudson's death was envisaged as the emotional center of the film, as he could be considered as Lightning and Mater's father, but finally, this idea was abandoned, and Lightning and Mater's friendship was retained.

It was originally planned that the World Grand Prix would be composed of five races rather than three, but two of them were removed because it was too much story to tell. The movie was also supposed to open in Prague, but Lasseter moved it to the ocean and the oil rigs, which he though would be a much more spectacular way of debuting the film and to announce its spy theme.

In the original Cars, the landscapes and buildings included numerous car elements and mechanical pieces. In Cars 2, this technique, referred to as "Car-ification", appears more prominently due to the important number of places visited. Lasseter wanted as much monuments as possible to be "car-ified". Therefore, all famous buildings in the real towns visited received important modifications to integrate in their architecture car grills, headlights, pistons, spark plugs, and many other car pieces, although the general appearance is conserved. Some buildings are even renamed, as Big Ben that becomes Big Bentley. Many also get bigger proportions to fit a car scale. For example, the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame's Cathedral in Paris are 50% bigger than the originals. The process extends itself to the culture. The use by gambling cars of fuzzy dices similar to those hanged in a decorative purpose inside a car, or the periodic table of elements that becomes the automotive table of elements, can be given as examples.

In 2009, Disney registered several domain names in relation to the title "World Grand Prix". However, only the title "Cars 2" has been released.

Marketing

The teaser trailer for Cars 2 appeared on the Blu-ray and DVD editions of Toy Story 3 when it was released on November 2, 2010.

The full length trailer for Cars 2 was released on Pixar's official YouTube account on November 15, 2010 and later appeared in front of the animated Disney film Tangled.

From early 2011 to the opening of Cars 2, Disney/Pixar massively published stills, video clips and concept art from the movie. Characters of the film where also regularly revealed, and for most of them a turntable video was provided.

Life-sized remote-controlled models of Lightning McQueen, Mater and Finn McMissile were created for Cars 2 as part of the “Agents on a Mission” tour, presented by State Farm, to promote the film. The cars were exposed in several North American cities, including Detroit, Toronto, Phoenix, Philadelphia, New York, Boston, Washington, DC, and Miami, among others.

Mattel and LEGO have produced toys derived from the movie. To promote the movie and its products, Lego recreated the official Cars 2 trailer using LEGO bricks. The result can be seen here.

At the occasion of the 2011 WonderCon, Disney also led a viral marketing campaign. Outside the convention center was parked an AMC Pacer with an inscription leading to the Twitter account @ChromeLeaks. This account gives a URL that redirects to a video, Cars N' Deals of Emeryville Sale-A-Bration!, which contains a number of Pixar-related references, plus a hidden message that will bring you to a video with new Cars 2 footage. In June, Disney/Pixar released another viral video, of lesser importance, V12 TV, which uses clips from Cars 2 to spoof popular television programs.

For the occasion of the Royal wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton, Disney/Pixar published a poster and a video clip featuring footage from the movie.

Jake Mandeville−Anthony v. The Walt Disney Company

On March 14, 2011 British screenwriter Jake Mandeville-Anthony filed a lawsuit against Disney and Pixar, saying the Cars franchise had similarities to characters and multiple screenplays, "Cookie & Co." and "Cars", which he developed in the early 1990's, alleging copyright infringement and breach of implied contract. Mandeville-Anthony claims he sent his story to a number of studios, including Disney and Pixar, and met with Jim Morris, then at Lucasfilm. He requested an injunction to stop the release of Cars 2 and actual or statutory damages. On July 27, 2011 the case was dismissed, preventing it from going to jury trial or ever being refiled. Disney’s attorneys proved that Mandeville-Anthony’s story, reportedly full of crude language and dialogue and highly offensive racist stereotypes, were very different from the Cars films.

Reception

Critical response

Cars 2 has received mixed reviews from the consensus of film critics. As of August 2011, review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes labeled the film "rotten", reporting that 37% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 156 reviews, with an average score of 5.5/10 with a "rotten" certification (the first Pixar film to do so), making it the lowest rated Pixar film. The consensus was: "Cars 2 is as visually appealing as any other Pixar production, but all that dazzle can't disguise the rusty storytelling under the hood. Another review aggregator, Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average score out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, calculated an average score of 57/100 based on 37 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Most critics felt the story lacked warmth and charm, and that the movie seemed like a ploy to sell merchandise. Other critics also found that the film had too much of a focus on Mater, rather than on McQueen. In addition, some critics thought that, due to the high amount of car chase scenes, gun violence, characters getting killed and other frightening moments, giving the film a G rating should have been put in question. It is the least critically acclaimed Pixar film. Several critics called Cars 2 "Pixar's first bad movie." Considering the low reviews given to a Pixar production, critic Kyle Smith of the New York Post said, "They said it couldn't be done. But Pixar proved the yaysayers wrong when it made its first bad movie, Cars. Now it has worsted itself with the even more awful Cars 2."

On the positive side, Peter Travers of Rolling Stone gave the movie 3 1/2 stars out of 4, and said that "the sequel is a tire-burning burst of action and fun with a beating heart under its hood." He also praised its "fluid script" and called it a "winner". Justin Chang of Variety praised the film, calling it "the rare sequel that improves on its predecessor, this lightning-paced caper-comedy shifts the franchise into high gear with international intrigue, spy-movie spoofery and more automotive puns than [a person] can shake a stickshift at." Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film 3 1/2 stars out of 4, saying; "At a time when some "grown-up" action films are relentlessly shallow and stupid, here is a movie with such complexity that even the cars sometimes have to pause and explain it to themselves."

Various comments on the New York Times reveiw and Amazon criticize the film, saying that the G rating is innapropriate due to the violence, torture, attempts to kill, etc., but is good as a James Bond spoof.

Box office performance

Cars 2 has earned an estimated $191,130,189 in the USA and Canada, and $360,400,000 in other territories, as of November 4, 2011, for a worldwide total of $551,530,189. During its opening weekend it made $109.0 million worldwide, marking the largest opening weekend for a 2011 animated title.

Cars 2 was released in 4,115 theaters in the USA and Canada on June 24, 2011. This set a record-high for Pixar, surpassing the studios' previous widest release Toy Story 3 (4,028 theaters), and marked the widest release for a G-rated film. It made an estimated $25.7 million on its debut Friday, marking the second-largest opening day for a Pixar film after Toy Story 3's $41.1 million, but it was still the third least-attended first day for a Pixar film, only ahead of Up and Ratatouille. It also scored the fourth largest opening day for an animated feature, trailing only Toy Story 3, Shrek the Third ($38.4 million) and The Simpsons Movie ($30.8 million). On its opening weekend as a whole, Cars 2 debuted at No.1 with $66.1 million domestically, marking the largest opening weekend for a 2011 animated feature. In its second weekend, however, the film dropped 60.3%, the largest second weekend drop ever for a Pixar film, and grossed $26.2 million.

Overseas, it grossed $42.9 million during its first weekend, finishing at #1. It performed especially well in Russia where it grossed $9,424,378, marking the best opening weekend for a Disney or Pixar animated feature (surpassing Tangled's $8.9 million and WALL•E's $5.2 million respectively). In Brazil, it earned $5,187,143 on its opening weekend ($7,083,757 with previews), marking the highest-grossing opening for Pixar and for a Disney animated film. It also premiered at No.1 with $5,159,522 in Australia, where it debuted simultaneously with Kung Fu Panda 2 and out-grossed it.