Elemental 2023
I got preview tickets and got good seats, able to watch in 3D (it opens tomorrow night). Reviews were so-so, which is especially disappointing for a Pixar movie, but they have not been in peak form lately. This movie is enjoyable, but is not going to break them out of their slump. It takes a few common movie tropes to put together a framework of a story (unlikely romance plus a young daughter of immigrants) and then adds a whole lot of complications and magic because these two star-crossed lovers are not just from different sides of the tracks, but entirely different elements, one fire and the other water. This world also has people who are earth (or plants) and air (clouds). There is a lot of setup for the plot, the characters, and the rules of this world, which takes a while and isn't that rewarding, but it does pick up steam as it goes. The themes are maybe a little too common, but I think Pixar (and Disney) is trying to bring people's personal stories to the screen that represent a lot of different backgrounds, and people have pretty similar stories, so the story isn't groundbreaking. I did like a lot of the clever things the animators could do with characters made of fire or water. There is a whole new city for these elemental people, like in Zootopia, which keeps things interesting. There aren't a huge amount of laughs for kids, since it is more of a story for older kids and adults. I feel like some people are going to love this and some people are going to say it doesn't work. I didn't love it, but I did enjoy it. They throw a lot out there and it doesn't always work (a tree person picking a flower from his underarm, twice!), but it always looks good at least. I may be overrating a bit, but I'm going to give it a low B+.
I got to see it in 3D, but I don't know feel like the visuals made great use of 3D effects. Also, there is an opening animated short titled "Carl's Date" featuring Carl and Dug from Up. It is okay. It is fun seeing Dug and nice to hear Ed Asner even though he passed away a couple of years ago.
Written: 14 Jun 2023
Owned on: Digital