Review of One Man Band

The beauty of Pixar's animated shorts, is their ability to emanate innovation and creativity. A chance for the team to experiment with various techniques. We saw it in the evolutionary 'Geri's Game' and the musically engrossing 'Boundin'. So then we come to One Man Band, a short involving two varyingly different one man bands trying to earn a coin from a young girl. A storyboard absent of any dialogue, focusing on musical implementation and pantomime to provide a narrative backbone. It's Giaccino's short as much as it is the studio's, with the differing clashes of instrumental compositions exhuming the composer's natural fluidity in producing scores. The brass and percussion tonally challenging the strings and woodwind, to then culminate into a bittersweet symphony of obvious storytelling.

The character flavour comes from the instruments, and unfortunately lacks that subtle ingenuity to make the animation in its entirety ever-lasting. The forced humour exposed at the end of the conflicting composition, from the little girl, somewhat diminished the talent that these one man bands had acquired. Never mind the fact that the instruments themselves must've cost a fortune, and the fact they are battling it out for just one gold coin. Its simplicity and lack of characterisation makes this a forgettable short, despite Giaccino's inventive score. Tell you what, if one of them used a triangle, they would've instantly won in my book...