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Edinburgh International Film Festival opened with an animation and the theme continued this weekend with the much anticipated premiere of Toy Story 3.

It may have lacked the magic of the opening night - three separate screenings in a busy multiplex doing little to maintain the excitement and even the characters from the film posing for photos on the red carpet, bailing out after the second wave of fans - but the film itself lived up to all the hype.

It's been 15 years since the first film - and this one moves the human characters along on the same timescale.

Thus, Andy, the little boy from the first film is off to college, and the toys fear their only options are the attic or the bin.

By accident, they end up in a local daycare centre, where they're welcomed by a new set of cast-off toys, and look forward to a new generation of children playing with them but all is not as it seems.

The film is aimed fairly and squarely at those who grew up with the films - who like Andy, will be in their 20s now - and perhaps their parents too.

In jokes

That's not to say the younger fans won't enjoy it - but there are lots of in jokes and other film references which will soar right over their heads.

A horror movie flashback, for example, when we find out why Chuckles the Clown lost his smile and the brilliant voice casting of Ned Beattie as Lotso the strawberry-scented bear.

Older film fans who recognise the dulcet tones of Superman's arch enemy Lex Luther will realise from the start that this kindly old bear isn't what he seems.

Also brilliantly funny, even without seeing his rubber faced gestures, is Michael Keaton as Ken - as in Ken and Barbie, complete with dream house, walk-in wardrobe and constant protests of "I'm not a girls' toy".

And Timothy Dalton as a would-be thespian hedgehog may have the tiniest of cameos but threatens to steal the show.

Set-piece chases

There's a lovely joke about Buzz Lightyear being reset and returning as a Spanish toy - a knowing nod to the international marketing franchise the toys from the film have become - and there's some great set-piece chases and narrow escapes, not least a plunge into a landfill furnace - where the toys are left holding hands, grimly facing the end.

I'm sure I wasn't the only adult to wonder if they were about to end the story in the darkest way possible.

Then again, that's the thing about seeing the film before anyone else does - and I'm not telling you what happens!

Suffice to say, there is scope for a sequel but I understand there's little appetite for that at Pixar.

Indeed there was news of their next big feature from two of the film's animators who attended the Edinburgh premiere.

They're working on a brand new title called Brave - which is set in Scotland, based on a fairytale The Bear and The Bow, and voiced by Reece Witherspoon.

It'll open in 2012 and I'm sure Hannah McGill at the film festival will have her eye on that one.