In Cars , which took 5 years to make, we have one Lightning McQueen, and his story. It's his rookie season, like Michael Jordan – everything is about speed for the young upstart. A total egomaniac, he gets separated from his racing crew and finds himself lost in Radiator Springs, wherein he gets trapped by jealous cars. He needs help to make it to the Piston Cup, the championship race, only he can't find any.

The film was truly a technological achievement; being able to animate cars to replicate humans was a real trial. They had to integrate the car world with the acting world, a tough challenge for the company. Still, “the art challenges the technology and the technology challenges the art,” said Clark, adding that it was tough to figure out the differences between animating, say, a Semi and a Fiat roadster. Both have to “act,” and both do, successfully. But it's a hard process, especially eyes, which are huge technological challenges. Unlike The Incredibles , wherein the characters could act like humans because they were supposed to be superhumans, Cars doesn't allow such luxury. There are no arms and legs to animate, for example. So the creators had to come up with clever ways around this.

And they successfully did, at least to me, as I watched the first clip from the film. Here, McQueen is trying to get out of Radiator Springs, but no one wants to help him. Rather, they'd like to keep him there, especially Luigi, the Fiat, who only follows European racing and is thus unimpressed with McQueen and his need to get to the Piston Cup. Meanwhile, a couple, two sedans, comes along, and, although lost, the “man” won't ask for directions. They pass by a hotel, which offers a free “Lincoln Continental breakfast,” and the Casa della Tires, owned by Luigi and featuring the Leaning Tower of Tires. The “man” gets hit by an old car, leaving the bumper sticker, “Nice Butte – Radiator Springs.” In all, it was a clever clip, one that shows promise for an excellent feature film.

The character design doesn't stop at the characters themselves, by the way. Radiator Springs itself is a major player, as is the racing forum that begins the film. McQueen pulls a thing called Bessie, and Lesseter, the director, wanted the audience to be able to smell the tar… and, I think, the WonderCon audience did. In all, “anal retentive” details were put to work.

To make the film, the team at PIXAR had to rely on collaboration at every instant. It took mundane work to get to the nugget of truth in each character, said Rivera. It's a long process, they all claimed, but one that was rewarding and great fun, because when you finish one thing and hand it off to the next person, you know that thing will only get better and better. Soon, the character is acting without hands and feet, an amazing innovation only PIXAR could pull off.

The second clip shown was the beginning of the film, a race car scene. Here, stock car racing and NASCAR influences abound, and everyone had to learn about culture of racing, how they change tires, security, police, etc. Executing the sequence took many things, imagination, engineering, and animation among them. Each one of those 32 race cars has a sponsorship, for example. Fake brands, that is. The pit stop animation had to be spot on. They even hired a sports consultant, Arnie Kempner from Fox. They had to find out where a camera would be placed in a race, so that that aspect would be technically correct. So they put a camera on turn 2, so that NASCAR fans know it's an authentic “race,” while others in the audience could just enjoy the spectacle, finding it interesting and engaging, grounded in reality and believability. Though what we saw was only a rough draft – “the paint is still wet, not quite ready,” one of the PIXAR representatives said – it looked pretty darn perfect to me. This sequence alone had been in production for 1 ½ years. As clever as the other scene, this one featured a realistic sports discussion with Darrell Cartrip and Bob Cutlass (Bob Costas' voice) as the race progressed and poor little Lightning McQueen was forced off the road.

Cars should make PIXAR and Disney a lot of money, securing their partnership in spades. Twenty years into one man's dream to make animation through the computer has led to innovation after innovation. Also shown was the company's Oscar-nominated short film, One Man Band , which was as funny and clever as the full-length looks to be.

Stay tuned to the IESB for further updates!