It’s All In Your Head: Director Pete Docter Gets Emotional In ‘Inside Out’

NPR:

Why do songs get stuck in your head? Where did that weird dream come from last night? The new Disney Pixar film Inside Out takes an animated peek into the inner workings of our minds.

The film follows 11-year-old Riley, who is uprooted from her home in Minnesota when her father starts a new company in San Francisco. This normally joyful girl becomes sad and angry when she’s forced to leave the house, the friends and the hockey team she loves. Much of the film takes place inside her head, where there’s a control room operated by five characters who personify her primary emotions: Joy is voiced by Amy Poehler, Anger by Louis Black, Fear by Bill Hader, Disgust by Mindy Kaling and Sadness by Phyllis Smith.

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Dr. Paul Ekman — who worked in San Francisco, still does, which is where Pixar Animation Studios is — he had early in his career identified six. That felt like a nice, manageable number of guys to design and write for. It was anger, fear, sadness, disgust, joy and surprise. As I was sort of doodling I was thinking, “Surprise and fear — probably fairly similar.” So let’s just lose surprise and that left us with five.

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