‘Lightyear’ Artisans on Film’s Themes and Achieving the IMAX Experience

Time is a construct of which we are all familiar. It’s the universal truth that there is simply never enough of it. Which makes it the perfect theme for Pixar’s Lightyear. Billed as their first Sci-Fi epic, the Toy Story spinoff is an origins story — and film that Andy watched as a kid — for the title character who accidentally maroon’s his entire crew on an uninhabited planet.

In his attempts to undo his mistake, Buzz Lightyear (Chris Evans) goes on hyperspeed test flight missions, the more he is affected by time dilation. Meaning Buzz ages minutes whereas his fellow crew age years. And these missions begin to take their toll on our hero, who discovers that the irony of his time-related missions.

The Nerds of Color had a chance to talk to director Angus MacLane and producer Gayln Susman about a Pixar film with such a heavy theme and trying to make a movie about the movie that Andy watched as a kid that would eventually introduce the world to the beloved Buzz Lightyear.

A NEED FOR HYPERSPEED – In Disney and Pixar’s “Lightyear,” Buzz Lightyear (voice of Chris Evans), after being marooned on a hostile planet, attempts multiple test flights in an effort to reach hyperspeed and return home. Directed by Angus MacLane (co-director “Finding Dory”) and produced by Galyn Susman (“Toy Story That Time Forgot”), the sci-fi action-adventure opens in U.S. theaters on June 17, 2022. © 2022 Disney/Pixar. All Rights Reserved.

Additionally, we also had a chance to talk to Lightyear’s director of photography, Jeremy Lasky, about the film’s use of virtual cameras and how they utilized new technologies to achieve the IMAX experience.