Party Central (2013) User Reviews

Not up to par with what I usually expect from most Pixar short films.

[Hellmant · 6/10 · 26 March 2014]

'PARTY CENTRAL': Three Stars (Out of Five)

The second Pixar animated short in the 'MONSTERS, INC.' film series. It takes place shortly after 'MONSTERS UNIVERSITY' and tells the story of Mike and Sully (once again voiced by Billy Crystal and John Goodman) helping their Oozma Kappa frat brothers throw a party. They come up with the plan of using a 'door station' to sneak into parties, at other fraternities, and steal guests and refreshments (while passing them through the bedroom of a sleeping couple). It also features the voice talents of actors Sean Hayes, Dave Foley, Charlie Day, Joel Murray, Julia Sweeney and Peter Sohn and was written and directed by longtime storyboard artist Kelsey Mann. It's 5 minutes long and plays in theaters before 'MUPPETS MOST WANTED'. I found it to be amusing enough but not up to par with what I usually expect from most Pixar short films. I have seen a lot worse animated movies though and I'm sure most fans of the 'MONSTERS, INC.' franchise will enjoy it.

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Short and Fun,

[lesleyharris30 · 8/10 · 25 March 2014]

Party Central is a very funny,quick and very enjoyable short film.It shows before Muppets Most Wanted and really warms you up and gets you excited for the feature film.I didn't know this short film was coming,and I usually do before I see the movie,and it was a very pleasant surprise,I was very happy to see these characters again,even if it was just for a few minutes,and was very impressed that they got Billy Crystal and John Goodman to record dialogue for Mike and Sully.Party Central is a few minutes of fun and comedy that fans of Monsters Inc and Monsters University should really appreciate.

When their college friends throw a house party that no one shows up to,Mike and Sully go against school rules in order to get people to go to the party.

House dance

[Prismark10 · 6/10 · 13 November 2016]

Party Central is a fun animated short shown in the cinemas with Muppets Most Wanted and takes place after the events of Monsters University.

Mike and Sulley go to Monsters University to see how their Oozma Kappa fraternity brothers are doing. The answer is not too well as no one has shown up for their first party.

Mike and Sulley liven it up using a borrowed portal door to sneak into the party at the rival fraternities and steal its food and guests to get their party started and then to keep it swinging.

They regularly go through the wardrobe doors of a married couple's bedroom that disturbs them and leads to a hilarious end credit gag.

As with other Pixar shorts the quality of the animation and voice work is very good and kids will find this enjoyable.

A monster party

[TheLittleSongbird · 7/10 · 25 June 2019]

Saw 'Party Central' for many reasons. Love animation, and always have done as a child, will be forever grateful towards it for helping me relax when very much needed. Love Pixar and a vast majority of their films, in my mind 'Monsters Inc' is one of their best if not quite one of my all-time favourite animated films. Really like to love their theatrical short films and the feature-related shorts are fun enough though don't put them on the same level personally.

One of their feature related shorts, 'Party Central' is enjoyable enough but nowhere near a Pixar high point to me. Being still very well made and characterised, but an example of the Pixar feature-related shorts that doesn't quite have the same amount of charm and heart of the feature film. Of the feature related shorts, 'Party Central' is neither among the best or worst and fits very comfortably in the middle. Which is a solid position to be in. Very like the other 'Monsters Inc' related short 'Mike's New Car'.

'Party Central' is a bit hectic in terms of pacing, due to having a lot of content in a short, perhaps a little too short, period of time.

It's not really going to remembered for its story either, which is somewhat lost amongst the physical humour. While it's very funny and colourful, it doesn't have the same amount of heart that 'Monsters Inc' has.

The physical humour though is very funny, timed beautifully and looks great in the animation. Just as good is the verbal comedy, which is as sharp and witty as one expects. There is more than enough energy and it is a party that one would be happy to be at. Mike and Sulley are still the great characters and double act that they were in 'Monsters Inc' and the supporting characters are colourful and amusing (if not near as memorable as those in 'Monsters Inc'.

Voice acting is very good, wonderful in the case of Billy Crystal and John Goodman. Can't imagine anybody else voicing Mike and Sulley. The music captures the party mood adeptly, but one of 'Party Central's' best assets is the animation. It is beautifully vibrant and rich in background detail, have also always admired how real Sulley's furry character design looks.

Altogether, enjoyable short. 7/10

Party Central was a pretty funny short sequel to Monsters University

[tavm · 7/10 · 28 March 2014]

This Pixar short, which takes place not long after Monster University, concerns a frat party that Mike and Sully organize for their friends. The 5 minutes that this runs for has a nice premise for such length and provides a funny enough ending. Nice to hear the entire cast for MU here especially Billy Crystal and John Goodman as those characters I mentioned at the beginning of this review. Since I need 10 lines for this to be submitted on this site, I'll also mention when I watched this with my movie theatre-working friend, the auditorium lights were on for a few minutes which marred the experience a bit but by the time of the climax, it was dark enough and made the final gag such a great surprise! So on that note, me and my friend very much liked Party Central.

Party!

[SnoopyStyle · 7/10 · 26 March 2019]

This is a Monsters University short. The Oozma Kappa frat is having a party but nobody showed up. It's Mike and Sulley to the rescue. They have brought along two Door Stations to steal party goers from the Roar Omega Roar frat party. It's a rocking time and then Squishy's mother arrives to show how to truly use the Door Stations for a party trick.

This is fun and this is fun franchise. It's not complicated. There are loads of gags. Oh by the way, it's fun.

PARTY CENTRAL!!!!

[tonydimasofilms · 10/10 · 7 November 2020]

I LOVE this Short! So simple, college relatable for those who dorm away... maybe, very clever, everything about it was just AWESOME! Kind of makes me regret not going away to college. But given the circumstances... it's not that big of a deal. Regardless... LOVED THIS!!

Funny enough

[CubsandCulture · 7/10 · 13 January 2021]

Mike's New Car has a lot more charm but this is goofy short that makes get use of the film's internal logic. Talk about taking a concept to its conclusion. It is funny enough to check out.

About as long, but 10 times better than . . .

[oscaralbert · 7/10 · 24 March 2014]

. . . the short that also ran this month before the MR. PEABODY AND SHERMAN cartoon feature. That piece of c*&$, titled ABOUT HOME, was so embarrassingly deficient in entertainment value and so widely castigated on this site and others, that no one even is allowed to review it anymore anywhere on the internet (except in a back-door sort of way, like this). That's because of a series of recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions which state that only DOLLARS have free speech rights in today's America, NOT people (this is sometimes referred to as the "Money Talks Doctrine"). PARTY CENTRAL is so much better than ABOUT HOME because it has a beginning (Mike & Sully's frat pledge party is a dud), middle (let's steal someone else's party through the clever use of monster-to-human doorways), and end (Greatest Frat Party EVER!!). It even has a "denoument" (to satisfy any Francophiles in the audience), with Timmy's parents complaining to their son that they have monsters in their closet. Six thumbs up! (Too bad the MUPPETS MOST WANTED feature which followed PARTY CENTRAL was not quite as good.)

Pixar's most unacceptable mistake

[jfgibson73 · 3/10 · 24 July 2023]

I don't really approve of the conceit of this short film. The story goes that Mike and Sully want to use a trick to get people to a frat party that is completely dead. They use Monster's Inc doors to lure partygoers from a raging party into the lame frathouse. First of all, aren't there restrictions on how doors can be used? Wouldn't doors be off limits to students? Or did this take place after Mike and Sully became interns, in which case, wouldn't they still be in trouble for using work doors after hours? Secondly, they also steal food and drinks from the other party. And third, their process escalates until they end up disrupting a human family in a very unethical way. So really, this story idea should never have been approved, and I will expect Pixar to redact this entry from their official output. They will also need to find a way to provide reparations to viewers, as this short has been widely available for 10 years now.

Fun stays in the film

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 9 September 2015]

I have to say I quite enjoyed the two Monster's films so far, also the new one about university life. This one tells us a bit more about partying on the campus. Mike and Sully use one of these portal doors to lure the guests from another party to their party. The antagonists are once again this other sorority with the cool guys. Unfortunately the humor is not too great in these 5 minutes here. The only thing I found funny about this one was the mom, who seems so harmless and then proves to be a huge party animal. Still, it's all fairly generic and predictable and lacks the charm of the feature films. Kelsey Mann directed this one and many of the famous Pixar directors started working on short films. If he becomes one of them, I truly hope he can step things up soon. Not a great watch by any means. The only somewhat good thing is that they got all the actors from the "real" films to appear in here as well. Still that's almost a given these days. Loud yes. Interesting nope. Thumbs down.

Quite ordinary development

[MK_Movie_Reviews · 2/10 · 24 August 2021]

Yes, just like they said in this movie, the party is lame!!