I think this is going to piss some people off…but I do have a confession to make:
I did not like Inside Out.
Look, I’m sorry (kind of) that I didn’t find it as sad as people made it out to be. Maybe my Sadness is on her day off, or something. It’s not even about the emotional part of the movie. I was never a fan of these animated films from Pixar because their plots are pretty straightforward, and their messages are very “in your face”, if you will. In my opinion, the movie is not for me. That doesn’t make it an objectively bad movie.
Okay, with my self-crucifixion out of the way, let’s talk about emotions.
Inside Out portrays emotions as these independent beings that trigger how you feel in reaction to what they’re seeing, not what the individual is seeing. There are five core emotions: Anger, Fear, Disgust, Sadness, Joy.
For the record, my favorite character of the lot is Sadness (ironic, isn’t it?). I love how by the end Sadness was not seen as this emotion that needs to be pushed away; it’s an important emotion that acts as a signal to other people near you. Though I wasn’t a big fan of the movie, I enjoyed how this was portrayed.
Anyhow, this is an analysis, so on we go. I want to talk about the James-Lange Theory of Appraisal. It’s very present in the scene where Riley first sees the inside of her new house (situation). She notices how run-down it is, how there are dead things in corners, how it’s nothing like her old house (arousal). Riley has an interpretation (that this is much worse than her old house, which also had a better neighboring area), and that’s where the emotions (the characters) start fiddling with the terminal. Joy is very adamant about keeping positive, meanwhile every other emotion is complaining.
I want to say this scene reminded me how I was as a kid, moving from place to place. It was always very bad on the first day, a lot of skepticism involved in it, sadness, etc. And it the back of my head, my own Joy was somewhere in there, trying to reassure me that things will be alright.
Of course, this implies that I was, and still am not, in control of my emotions. If they are a bunch of tiny humanoid creatures running around in my mind, it implies that I have no autonomy over what happens in there. Since we see that Riley is influenced a lot when Joy and Sadness are away from the terminal.
On the other hand, the Star Trek episode sees emotions as things which are pushed onto the other person. Slightly reminiscent of the Futurama Episode with Bender’s Empathy Chip, the episode involves a man named Alkar force his negative emotions onto Deanna Troi, justifying this action by saying he is able to work better without his negative emotions interfering.
He views emotion and thought as two separate entities, with the former being the most troublesome. This is the conventional way of seeing emotions. And man, is Alkar really blunt about it.
He straight up sees the bodies of other people are storage units for his negativity. It’s very ironic how he can’t see how bad these emotions are to other people who also play a role in the situation affecting the planet he is trying to “save”.
In any case…sorry for the lack of Quality Jokes™ today. It’s almost 2 am here in Greece, and it’s really hard to focus ;-;
I’ll be back soon, though. Wish me a safe flight…
Like please…I hate turbulence…
Warmly,
Guga Khidasheli
6 thoughts on “Analysis 4 — Cry Me A River, Why Don’t You?”
Hi Guga,
I think you did a great job breaking down the James-Lange Theory of Appraisal in the film Inside Out! They different steps of the theory were clearly portrayed in the scene you picked from the movie. When watching the film I was trying to envision my tiny little people (emotions) running around in my brain. It’s interesting to see how there are different ways in which people try to represent what’s actually going on biologically in our heads, though I think if there were people inside my head it would freak me out. You brought up a good point about how the Star Trek represented emotion as something that can be separated from you whereas in the film it was a key part of who you were. The polarizing approaches were helpful to see though because I feel like you can find some middle ground in there. We do off load our emotions onto other people (ex: venting), but deep down they are a part of us and how we understand the world around us.
Sarah Murphy
Hi Sarah,
I am so glad that you mentioned “venting” in this post. This is part of the ventilationist understanding of emotion–that emotions are things that we need to release. But venting doesn’t actual reduce our experience of an emotion. It actually strengthens it because through venting we rehearse the emotion; essentially, we are practicing it.
Jessica Hautsch
Hi Guga,
You don’t have to like Inside Out, and it’s alright if you didn’t cry at Bing-Bong sacrificing himself for Riley. It’s not like it makes you heartless monster or anything. Lol.
In all seriousness, you don’t have to like the movie, but you do a good job of analyzing it. Your observation about how the film presents James-Lange’s Theory of Appraisal is really great. It is worth noting that theorist of embodied cognition and the constructed theory of emotion reject this theory of emotions. They argue that the additional cognitive step of appraisal is unnecessary—it’s all about our direct perception of the situation.
As you note, in the film, we see emotions getting “trigged” by what happens to Riley, and these emotions control her response. This also at odds with what cognitive scientists have argued about emotion. It is not that your emotions are out of your control, triggered in response to a situation, but that your emotions are constructed by you through your embodied stimuli and within a particular cultural, social, and environmental context.
Good connection between Star Trek and Futurama (there are actually a surprising (or maybe not surprising) number of similarities between those shows). You do a great job of discussing how Aklar views emotion and thought as separate entities. We might think about what effect his lack of negative affect has on his ability to reason.
Jessica Hautsch
Hi Guga! Don’t be ashamed for not enjoying a movie, that is totally ok. Sadness is my favorite character too. I think she was the most caring (even though Joy portrays herself that way. Very true how it shows that it acts as a signal to those around you. We see Joy come to this realization looking at the core memory of Riley being held up by her Prairie Dog pals. She realized that they wouldn’t have done this without knowing that she was sad. It’s interesting that you looked more at Riley regarding the James Lange Theory- I looked more at the emotions and thought they depicted Arnold’s Appraisal Theory of Emotion. I think it’s all a matter of perspective.
Very good connection between Star Trek and Futurama. Bender was forced to feel emotions from the chip while Deanna was forced to feel emotions by the “funeral meditation.” Alkar is a disgusting person. Picard called him a coward and he is correct. Alkar doesn’t like dark emotions so he sacrifices others for his own benefit.
Good luck with your flight when you come back from Greece! And stay safe out there.
Sara Giarnieri
Hi Guga!
Super jealous of your Greece trip but I hope you had an amazing time! Honestly how Star Trek looks at emotions is extremely outdated; they are not something that is forced upon us but in fact something we feel. Our emotions are deeply tied to how we perceive and experience the world and without them, our perceptions wouldn’t be the same. If I didn’t feel guilt anymore, I wouldn’t do half the things I need to because I just wouldn’t care to, and I would begin to do things I would never do to being with. Our emotions are a direct result of pushing us to do actions and the actions themselves. So “pushing” them onto others is just an outdated psychological thought experiment before we got deeper into the science of the mind. Great job as always and I thought this post was just as, if not funnier than your last posts, keep up the great work!
snaraujo
Hi Steph,
Great point about how our emotions shape our perception of the world! Consider how our experience of the event or situation can shift depending on if we are feeling happy, sad, or angry.
Jessica Hautsch