The Pixar Story

The Pixar Story (2007) is an 87-minute documentary you can watch online on iFILM, directed by Leslie Iwerks. It traces how a small computer-graphics division inside Lucasfilm grew into the studio that permanently changed the animation industry.

The film follows Pixar from its early experiments with 3-D rendering through the release of Toy Story in 1995 — the world's first feature-length CGI film — and the string of eight consecutive hits that followed. Steve Jobs, who bought the company from George Lucas for $10 million in 1986, appears on camera alongside founders Ed Catmull and John Lasseter, plus directors Pete Docter and Andrew Stanton. A parallel thread tracks how Pixar's rise accelerated the decline of hand-drawn animation at Disney itself.

What makes this worth watching is its specificity: Iwerks (granddaughter of Disney collaborator Ub Iwerks) goes beyond the inspirational-studio myth and shows the actual business decisions, technical breakthroughs and near-collapses that shaped each film. Stream The Pixar Story (2007) online on iFILM.