A Bug's Life, officially trademarked as a bug's life, is a 1998 American CGI film produced by Pixar Animation Studios and released by Walt Disney Pictures and Buena Vista Distribution in the United States on November 25, 1998. A Bug's Life was the second Disney/Pixar feature film and the third American computer-animated film after Toy Story and Antz.
Every season, a colony of ants are expected to harvest food for a Mafia-like bunch of grasshoppers. One ant, Flik, is an inventor whose creations usually do more harm than good. While trying out a mechanical harvester, he accidentally knocks the pile of food into a stream just before the grasshoppers arrive. Their leader, Hopper, gives the ants the rest of the season to make good on what they owe, but orders a double ration of food after Flik stands up to him in defense of the Queen's youngest daughter, Dot. Flik is tried by the colony’s royal council and is admonished for his actions. Princess Atta, Dot's older sister and the eventual successor of the queen, is unsure about how to deal with him. When Flik suggests that he might try to recruit some "warrior bugs" to fight the grasshoppers, the council accepts it. Reaching the insect "city," built from discarded boxes and cans, Flik encounters a troupe of unemployed circus bugs whose latest performance has just ended in disaster. He mistakes them for the warriors he needs; at the same time; they believe him to be a talent scout who wants to book their act on the island. They return to the colony, much to Atta’s surprise, and are immediately greeted as heroes who can put an end to the threat posed by Hopper’s gang. Atta soon becomes suspicious after almost overhearing a conversation in which both Flik and the troupe realize their mistakes. However, after they band together to save Dot from a hungry bird, she begins to think that the troupe may be able to stop the grasshoppers after all. She also starts to fall in love with Flik.
At the grasshopper gang’s hideout, Hopper’s brother Molt suggests that they not go back, since they have more than enough food stored up and the weather will soon turn bad. Hopper reminds him and the whole gang that if they do not keep the ants living in fear, the ants might use their superior numbers ("a hundred to one," he estimates) to run the grasshoppers out of the colony for good. The gang sets out for the island to collect their due. When Flik discovers that Hopper is afraid of birds (due to him almost getting swallowed by a blue jay a few years ago), he proposes that the colony build a model bird to scare him away. The ants put their food-gathering work on hold to carry out this project, but as they finish, circus ringmaster P. T. Flea arrives looking for his missing performers and accidentally exposes the truth. Upset at Flik’s deception, Atta orders him exiled from the colony, while the other ants hide the bird and rush to collect whatever food they can for Hopper. They are unable to meet the double quota he set, and when the gang arrives, he takes over the anthill and forces the ants to bring him all the food on the island.
Dot overhears the gang’s plans to kill the queen once they have all the food, and she rushes to catch up with Flik, who has left the colony with the troupe. She persuades them to return and put the bird plan into action, with help from her and some of the other young ants. The model frightens the gang, and they almost retreat until P. T. intervenes and inadvertently incinerates it. Enraged, Hopper sends his crazed assistant Thumper to injure Flik, but Flik is still able to stand up and rally the other ants, saying that the grasshoppers depend on the extorted food for their own survival. The entire colony swarms against the gang, forcing them to leave and shoving Hopper into one of the circus 'cannons'. However, a thunderstorm overhead breaks and it begins to rain, causing panic among the ants. Hopper, now obsessed with killing Flik, is forced out of the 'cannon' when Dim the rhino beetle is flung on top of it and is sent flying towards Flik and Atta.
In his rage, he grabs Flik and flies off, evading the troupe until Atta intervenes and rescues Flik. They lure him towards the bird's nest and get separated. Hopper finds Flik and corners him against the nest, beginning to strangle him and revealing his intention of returning to the colony with more grasshoppers, until the bird emerges. Hopper, believing this bird to be another model, taunts Flik until realizing it's real. Hopper attempts to escape, but it picks him up and feeds him to its chicks. The colony adopts Flik's harvester to speed up grain collection. Passing her princess crown to Dot, Atta is crowned the new queen and chooses Flik as her mate. Before the troupe can leave, they must wait for one member, Heimlich the caterpillar, to emerge from the chrysalis in which he has encased himself. He pops out with a tiny pair of butterfly wings, far too small to lift him off the ground, and the troupe (with Molt, acting as a road crew assistant) departs with the colony’s thanks.