Knick Knack (1989) User Reviews

Nice early Pixar short

[rbverhoef · 8/10 · 9 February 2005]

'Knick Knack' starts with a couple of souvenirs taken from vacation in Florida. We see some palm trees dancing and a beach bunny dancing on a nice little tune. Then we take a look at the other end of the table. A souvenir from Alaska, a snowman in a glass dome, wants to join the hot party and especially the hot girl. He tries to break the glass of the dome in any way possible.

This animated short directed John Lasseter ('Toy Story', 'A Bug's Life') is a pretty impressive early film from the Pixar studio. It looks great and is inventive. The ending gives us the biggest laugh, but before that there are quite some funny moments.

Proves Pixar was onto something

[Agent10 · 7/10 · 11 June 2003]

Even when the whole idea of computer animation was still in its infancy, Pixar displayed ingenuity which wasn't even being thought of in the current industry. It just goes to show that Pixar is here to stay, and the serene cuteness of this little film proved to be one of the building blocks for a future empire.

A funny and good Pixar short

[emasterslake · 8/10 · 16 April 2005]

This is another Pixar short made during their early years.

It's about Knick Knacks, and the characters are knick Knacks resembling Warm places. While one is a snow globe with a Snow Man in it. He wants to join with the other Knick Knacks but he's stuck in his own Snow Globe.

Through out the short he tries all he can to escape from the Snow Globe. This short contains allot of Chuck Jones like references. And has some good animation on the snow flakes in the snow globe.

You're able to see it off of Find Nemo DVD.

Rate: 8/10 Very memorable and funny wish they start making a collector's line up of these knick knacks.

Judge this by 1989's standards and you'll realize its brilliance

[planktonrules · 10/10 · 12 February 2008]

If you watch this today, you're bound to enjoy this short quite a bit because of its wonderful humor and decent computer generated animation. However, when you realize that it was made almost 20 years ago AND the state of computers and computer graphics at that time, you'll know just how creative ahead of its time it was when it debuted. Think about it--most homes didn't have computers. Those who did had 386 processors or even less powerful processors and Windows 3.0 (a mess) was just about to debut. Serious animation STILL needed to be done with enormous and ridiculously expensive computers and the software for rendering these images couldn't be bought--it had to be created by Pixar. Unlike more modern CGI,where Dreamworks, Fox and even people at home can make nice quality graphics, this was all done from scratch. Talk about a huge undertaking!!!! So in light of all this, KNICK KNACK was an absolutely incredible film. Heck, even today, it's still incredibly funny and watchable. I might even put it STILL in the top 2 or 3 of Pixar's films because the script is so hilarious and poignant. A masterful achievement in every respect. So,...then WHY wasn't this film even nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film?!?! Several other Pixar films were but not KNICK KNACK--yet I loved this film and almost anyone (except the absolute worst curmudgeon) would also love this film! If anyone knows the answer to this conundrum, please drop me a line--I'm dying to know.

Short and very funny

[bob the moo · 10 July 2004]

In a room full of ornaments and toys, a group of dolls, little models and decorations all sit enjoying the warm temperature and glow of an unseen sun.

All, that is, except a single snowman, trapped inside a 'greetings from Alaska' snow dome. With a doll waving him on, he attempts to break out and enjoy the party.

Found on the DVD for Finding Nemo, I found this film to be funnier and much more enjoyable than the feature (although both were good). It stands to show that Pixar were onto something as, even if the graphics are a bit blocky compared to Nemo, the comedy is great and the characters are well enough created to be fun. The routine is basic – snowman tries to break out without much success, however it has such energy, pace and solid imagination that I was laughing consistently despite a slow start (ie the first 20 seconds – what a moaner!).

The animation is slick if not perfect and my early worries over the snowman were never realized. I thought he looked a bit too sinister to be a sympathetic character, but his mishaps helped win me round even if his features were still pretty rough and unlikely to get him the dolls in question! He is a great lead and you can't help but feel sorry for him – but not to the point where you stop laughing at him!

Overall this was a very pleasant surprise and the continuation of a very clever ploy in regards Pixar DVD's. I for one love the short films on many of their DVD's and I hope they continue doing it even if I would rather see them release a compilation DVD with all of them on one disk. Anyway, this was very well put together even if it has aged a bit and I laughed the whole way through it to the bittersweet ending – well worth seeing if you get the chance.

four minutes of the cutest Pixar animation yet

[Quinoa1984 · 10/10 · 21 October 2006]

This is a perfectly goofy time with Knick Knack, especially before a feature. It's four minutes of a situation, with a little snowman in a snow-globe pining for a little woman in the mix of a group of boppin-souvenirs. He finally gets out, but to a disastrous finale. It's very to the point in every measure, and all the while cute without actually being only for kids. In fact, I think I laughed at this harder now than I did when I first saw this as a kid. It's got a sense of humor to it that starts with the first shot, and continues all the way to the very end. Is it laugh-out-loud funny? Not entirely; it's got me 'heh-heh' type laughs all abound, with a few of the biggest laughs coming with the obvious pratfalls and errors. But even the music used is done with a big wink and a grin, especially during the end credits as the little voices are accompanied by a 'blah-blah-blah' voice. It's an Oscar-caliber little ruby of a short that, much like the early Disney shorts, doesn't overstay its welcome, and has an appeal ranging from 2 years old to 92 (to put it like a typical critic). It's a sweetly cruel piece of fluff.

Early Pixar

[TheOtherFool · 7/10 · 16 July 2004]

Funny little short comedy by the Pixar people, which I saw as an extra on the Finding Nemo DVD.

A snowman is trapped in one of those glass snow domes, but he wants to break out as all the other toys are having a good time in the sun. So he tries to break/blow his way through but things just don't work for him. When he and the dome finally fall down, we think he can escape but again, the dome gets the better of him...

Well made and fun, we can see why Pixar became such a huge company over the years. If you have the Finding Nemo DVD, make sure you check this one out.

7/10.

Great short-film!

[m0rpher · 10/10 · 25 July 2003]

This is truly a wonderful short-film. I love it!

The animation was great, the storyline is clever, and every time I've watched it, it's made me smile.

(Oh, and thumbs up to the amazing Bobby McFerrin for the awesome background music.)

one of Pixar's early efforts

[disdressed12 · 7/10 · 22 August 2008]

i thought this early animated short from Pixar was quite good.it's funny and ironic,plus it has a very catchy and infectious tune.it's also very low key,and movies at a nice sedate pace,which i liked a lot.it's from 1989,so it's a lot different than the animated films we have today.it's a very simple short with a simple story.considering it is nearly 20 years old,it's actually very well done.it's also much more clever than many animated shorts from today,and certainly back then.i'd check it out if you have the chance.you might be surprised at how much you enjoy it.or you might not be.either way,it's not like you're losing a couple of hours.for me,Knick Knack is a 7/10

A Solid Animation Short

[travisimo · 8/10 · 6 December 2003]

Before computer animation was all the rage, I bet the Pixar guys made this little gem simply as a labor of love. From this early creation, you can take a glimpse of the clever storytelling that would become a staple of Pixar's full-length features. This short gives you a chuckle as the disgruntled snowman struggles to get out of his snow globe to hang with the knick-knack ladies of Hawaii and Atlantis. It's quite a cute feature, but it can only go so far. I wouldn't consider it a classic like other animation shorts like `Mickey's Trailer' and `Duck! Rabbit, Duck!' but I think it will become a nice little treasure in the Pixar vault.

My IMDB Rating: 8/10

Not much to say...

[patrick_dunne · 7/10 · 22 January 2006]

Knick Knack is simply a short film that the theaters showed right before the movie. (I forgot which one it was- FInding Nemo or Monsters Inc?) I think it was one of Pixar's earliest short films. The story is about a snowman in a globe. He wishes to join all the other souvenirs outside of his globe, especially the hot Miami Beach souvenirs. So, he tries to break out of his snow globe.

I don't know what to say. It's a short film with no dialog. Instead, it has some psychical humor and a funny sense of irony at the end.

I suppose that I would recommend it, because Pixar is good at humor, and because it's only a couple minutes long. What else is there to say?

7/10

Feel free to send me a Private Message regarding this comment.

A wonderful, wonderful film

[rashah · 10/10 · 18 February 2003]

I first showed this to my business unit in 1996, to show that we needed to keep trying to achieve our goals, despite the setbacks along the way.

It became a kind of anthem for our team as we grew, and we ended up showing "the snowman film" at every group biannual meeting since.

I totally love the soundtrack, the animation, the story and everything about it - a real 10/10!

Dawn of the CG animation

[kr-kr-dr3 · 7/10 · 22 July 2013]

This is the early work of Pixar Animations Studio in 1989 (It was not under Disney's umbrella). Perhaps you may have seen this film once because it screened with famous Finding Nemo. The storyline of Knick-Knack is very simple. It is comedy story which a snowman in a glass dome fights desperately for his freedom. There is an unexpected ending in this film.

Perhaps, you may feel a little cheapness for its computer graphics than todays Pixar's animation. However, it is a work of 1989. Pixar's technique must stand conspicuously above the other CG studios. I feel that the expression of water in this film is very beautiful. The unique humor of Pixar exists from 1989 too.

Today youcan see various CG films made by Pixar Studio or Dreamworks SKG. If you see Knick-Knack, you may able to find efforts of CG producers. I hope advance of technique of CG animations forever.

Evolution of 3D Animation

[aci_J · 4/10 · 27 June 2018]

It's always incredible to see how fast technology moves in the modern age, and nothing shows that more than the evolution of 3D computer animation. Back when Pixar was owned by Apple founder Steve Jobs and merely six years before their first feature Toy Story, the animation studio produced several shorts that showed off the potential of their in-house software that would later go on to become Renderman. One of those shorts was Knick Knack, which follows a snowman in a snow globe as he tries to break out of his glass dome to join the other 'knick knacks' at a summer pool party. Although the animation is now considerably dated, particularly in the areas of texture detail and character motion, the humor still shines through to make it entertaining. Even so, the lack of a proper resolution to the story except for a cheap laugh means that it's unlikely you'll remember the short in the long term. The studio has certainly come a long way.

An early Pixar gem

[skad13 · 10/10 · 4 June 2003]

I first saw this Pixar short when it appeared in theaters in 1989 as part of a short-film project sponsored by American Express. It was like a great delight that popped up on the screen and then anonymously disappeared. I just saw the theatrical Pixar release Finding Nemo, and Pixar has had the great good sense to preface their new feature with this charming short. It's a 4-minute gem, with hilarious gags and great music by Bobby McFerrin. I hope Pixar puts this out on the Finding Nemo DVD. In the meantime, if you're seeing Finding Nemo, don't be late--Nemo is very good on its own, but this short is worth the price of admission in itself!

Excellent computer animated short

[James L. · 26 August 2000]

The animation is truly excellent, using dynamic structures and design. Very amusing script about a snowman in a snowglobe,as well as other " Knickknacks". Interesting concept and very good computer animation make this a gem. By Pixar, who later , after a series of milestone shorts, worked with Disney on several computer animated features.

Stone wall may not make a prison, but a snowglobe works fairly well here!

[llltdesq · 10/10 · 19 March 2002]

This has got to be one of the most delightful animated shorts I have ever seen in my life! It was once said that a man's reach should exceed his grasp. Watching this, I wondered if that includes snowmen! The ending of this was magnificent! I didn't know whether to laugh or cry! Pixar did a grand job here. While I know features are their bread-and-butter, I fervently hope they continue producing these little darts that score bullseyes most of the time. Pixar, please put your shorts back in circulation! Pardon me, but I need to get a certain snowman something that will cut through plastic! Most joyously recommended. A grand slam!

pixar

[academicwriting · 7/10 · 16 July 2013]

This is a funny animation movie. I think many generations from small children to senior people can enjoy watching it, because it uses the easy communication skills which are body language, the music, the look of toys character faces and their interesting reactions. The main character is a small snow man in the fine snow cup that everyone played with once. He tries to break from there in many ways that are beyond our expectations again and again, but the result is fluttering snow. Do you think his effort will make success in escaping? When I was an elementary school student, I watched the film and I cheered for him in my mind. Now I'm a college student, but I feels the same in my mind as when I was a child, which is interesting for me. So, you watch this movie with your family, and then you should exchange the impression. Maybe your remarks and your parents or children is the same. It will warm your heart.

very early Pixar

[Siloty · 10/10 · 18 June 2008]

this is a very early Pixar animation which i saw when i watched Finding Nemo at the cinemas and i found it an enjoyment.

a little snowman in a snow-globe sees a mermaid toy he is attracted to and tries all these different ways to get out of the snow-globe to get to the mermaid toy. you somewhat feel sorry for the snowman as none of his efforts actually succeed, and then the one that does, which is very simple, turns out against him in the end.

this is quite a simple yet entertaining little flick and i find every minute of this short counted. enjoyed by young people and older alike. Pixar have a thing for making good shorts.

poor little snowman

How cute a snowman is!

[rika-31302 · 6/10 · 10 August 2017]

This short animation film is simply fun with the monotonous background music. A snowman in a snow globe try to get out of the globe in some ways. It's especially interesting for me that he hits his nose with a hammer.

I've thought this is like "Toy Story". And then I can understand why I thought that because the director is the same as "Toy Story".

I have such a snow globe, and I imagine there is a snowman who wants to get out in my snow globe. If so, I feel a bit sad although I don't feel sorry for the snowman in this film. He should and have to be there as you can see from the ending of it.

Knick Knack

[skcn1818 · 8/10 · 5 July 2014]

I think the facial expression of the snowman is interesting. Although the snowman tries to escape out of the snow dome and join girls, he cannot do it. He says nothing during the film but the audience clearly understands what the snowman feels because of his facial expressions. In particular, this is an animation film and so I think that the expression is simple. These things make it easy for the audience to enjoy the film.

In addition, the composition of the story is interesting. This film contains many waves of feelings about the snowman. For example, first the snowman wants to join girls and become free. He does many things but he doesn't come out the snow dome. Then, he is afraid of his death because he almost drops down from a bookshelf. In the last, finally he comes out of the snow dome and not only the snowman but also the audience are happy but suddenly he is in the snow dome again. This last scene is unexpected and I think because of it, this film is very interesting.

A brilliant animation short with a philosophical view to the universe

[1qatreh · 7/10 · 24 April 2020]

This animation short is brilliant, considering its determinist philosophical view to the universe mixed with a very fitting narrative structure (specially due to its eastern style of philosophical symbolism which considers human beings as determined beings as toys; and reminds me of the great persian poet and philosopher, Khayam), along with a very good technical frame which was really avant-garde for its time. To construct a successful story with such qualities, is not an easy job to do, at all. So, one could comprehend how more difficult has been Mr. Lasseter's job to make it via an animation short film. No matter do we believe in determinism or not, believe me, there are not so many philosophical movies which do have a really good narrative and technical quality; and this short title is certainly one of them!

Story of toys

[berryberry32 · 9/10 · 25 July 2013]

This is a short PIXAR film which is about an ornament snowman. He is in a box of glass and wants to go out of it.

It is a very attractive movie because it is filled with fantasy. The viewers get excited to watch. It seems like another PIXAR story called "Toy Story," because the toys are playing in the movie.

What this story wants to tell is that it is hard to change your circumstances. You can not change your house easily. The circumstances of others might look more fascinating than your own. It is because you don't realize that your happiness is by you. You have to cherish yourself and your surroundings.

In conclusion, this short film is an exciting movie which attracts everyone, including kids and adults. You ought to look at your own surroundings carefully and love them.

Short and funny showman movie

[linshuli-99547 · 7/10 · 11 October 2023]

'Knick Knack' is a funny animation about a snowman who is trying his best to escape from a snow globe. The snowman falls in love at first sight with a girl. However, the snowman desperately tries to get out of the snow globe because he has to move out of the snow globe in order to touch her. When he finally manages to get out and meet her, he finds himself in the snow globe again.

I think it is brave of the snowman to make a desperate effort to meet and touch the girl. THe snowman was in the snow globe at first, and there was almost no chance of him getting out of the snow globe, but I'm glad that he never gives up and was able to see her for a moment at the end. I learned the importance of not giving up and working hard until the end from this movie.

It has been mutilated and sanitized for a commercial audience

[CubsandCulture · 5/10 · 28 December 2020]

The version that most people know of and have seen is the 2003 remastered version that played before Finding Nemo. In this version there are two major changes. First the animation had been remastered and spruced up. It is a lot slicker than the original 1989 release. Second, the women knick knacks had their breast reduced done to nearly nothing. In the 1989 the breasts were comically oversized to satirize the tackiness of knick knacks. It was also the joke for why the snowman so wants to get out of the globe.

One can debate whether the original was in good taste or not, whether it should be seen by kids or not but it was released in 1989. *At that point* it was in the world and the work-in my view-became the world's not Pixar's. For Pixar to go back and bowdlerize the original is-in my view-unacceptable and odious. If they feared parental reaction or thought the original was too risqué the better option was to not release it in front of Finding Nemo. It is immaterial that the 2003 version works almost-both are very funny-as well as the 1989 version.