Dir: Peter Sohn
Starring: Leah Lewis, Mamoudou Athie, Ronnie del Carmen, Shila Ommi, Wendi McLendon-Covey, and Catherine O'Hara
1h 43m
Pixar continues to explore the realms of emotions, both simplistic and complicated, with their progression of animated films targeted at young audiences, recently, however, focusing on a more mature youth demographic. "Elemental" is the newest film from the beloved animation studio, and the target narrative themes revolve around love, diversity, inclusion, and pursuing your passion. While these topics have their exploration in other Pixar films, like "Up," "Inside Out," and most recently "Turning Red," "Elemental" is the first to function and embrace the qualities of a bonafide rom-com. While the structure of this genre characteristic doesn't allow for many surprises or, like the best of Pixar animations, the thoughtful emotional dives that engage children and adults, watching a romantic comedy with shades of "Romeo and Juliet" without the tragedy, told through the vessels of animated elements of fire and water, is fascinating.
Element City is a special place where a mix of Fire, Water, Land, and Air residents live together. These elements coexist within the city, working and commuting together, except those residing in Fire Town. Ember Lumen (Leah Lewis) is a feisty and confident fireperson on the verge of taking over the family business from her parents (Ronnie del Carmen and Shila Ommi), who emigrated from Fire Land before Ember was born. Ember has an anger issue; it's a trait Ember's father would like her to have more control over. After a fiery outburst, a water pipe ruptures in the middle of the biggest sale of the year for the business. Ember, desperately trying to fix the water leak, meets Wade (Mamoudou Athie), a water person who emerges from the ruptured pipe and works for Element City.
Once Ember and Wade connect, their relationship quickly transitions through the familiar rom-com tropes; they move from misguided enemies to fast friends and eventually to a romantic couple. It's amusing to watch all these conventional genre setups take place through the characterization of two talking elements, a beautifully composed flickering flame for Ember and a glistening droplet of water for Wade. The story rarely strays from its blossoming love plot line; however, within the relationship-building scenes where Ember and Wade grow closer, "Elemental" soars with amusement surrounding the unique ways these characters interact with the environment around them, most sweetly, how fire and water are inherently connected even though tradition wants to keep them separated.
The artistic composition of Element City, along with the residents living within, is elegantly rendered. Pixar continues to push their creativity in animation design, "Elemental" is no different as almost every character has a consistently unique, meticulously constructed arranged motion throughout their form. In one of the best scenes, Ember and Wade go to a sports arena and watch a game called Air Ball; the animation throughout this scene uses all the specific characters abilities, even allowing Wade to organize a literal wave with the screaming home team fans.
It's fun watching Pixar compose such a universally familiar cinematic story. Romantic comedy films have many renditions, modified through changing societal, political, and cultural lenses worldwide, but the core characteristics remain the same. Two lovable people met either cleverly or disastrously. They find common ground, which leads to a budding romance. Some situational force is applied to pull them apart, the couple realizes they can't live without one another, and amidst some calamitous final obstacles, a happy ending arrives against the odds. It's a formula that Pixar engages throughout "Elemental" that allows for the indulgence of metaphors surrounding race relationships, cultural misunderstandings, immigration, and socioeconomic inequalities. With these underlying narrative commentaries, the story paints a surface-level world where acceptance and love conquer all, where our differences shouldn't cloud the emotion of love for family, community, or that special someone in your life. It's only as the film moves further into its world-building, where Fire people hate Water people for perplexing reasons, where cultural identifiers are introduced, when the metaphors implied by the world and characters start to feel muddled. Still, as Pixar leans into the romantic comedy, it's hard not to get wrapped up in the feel-good qualities of watching two people find friendship and love in a complicated world.
Monte's Rating
3.50 out of 5.00
