2023-05-27 23:32:47
EThere can be many reasons why love between two people doesn’t work out: for example, because one person is a mermaid and the other is a human being, one is a criminal and the other is a police officer. Or, and this is where it gets particularly difficult: one water and the other fire. Yes, Pixar’s latest animated film is about romantic love. Where Peter Sohn’s previous hits like Finding Nemo, Ratatouille, Wall E and Oben focused more on the value of friendship, Elemental now addresses the most classic of all relationship dilemmas: Are we compatible?
Water boy Wade Ripple (Voiced by Mamoudou Athie) vaporizes with passion when he gets close to hot fire lady Ember Lumen (Voiced by Leah Lewis). Conversely, he could erase her at any time with his wet touch. A relationship therefore seems doomed to fail. Chance brought them together in the form of a burst water pipe in the Embers Restaurant, where her calf was almost washed up in front of her feet. Now they want to work together to save Element City, home to various water, earth, air and fire creatures, from disaster. Because floods caused by giant steamers threaten to destroy the Feuerviertel. The two friends can only avert the disaster if they join forces.
Were it not for one or the other additional problem. Ember’s parents, for example, are not allowed to know about her relationship with Wade because they harbor prejudices against aquatic creatures – when Wade finally, disguised as a food inspector, is carried away to the careless remark that the food offered by Ember’s father would taste even better watered down, the uninvited one gets it Guest finally banned from the house. Wade’s family, on the other hand, welcomes Ember as if it were their own daughter – she has to be carefully pushed through the flooded living room on an air mattress so as not to accidentally come into contact with the deadly liquid.
Admittedly, many of the dialogues are bursting with self-realization calendar sayings and love clichés that were actually believed to have been left behind since Pixar’s revolutionary “Soul”. The loving design of Element City has some nice ideas ready for this. The director and animator Peter Sohn, who grew up in New York as the son of Korean immigrants, commemorates his hometown with the colourful, lively Element City, which is divided into different neighborhoods.
The Fire District seems more artisanal and down-to-earth than the affluent waterfront that leans toward Manhattan’s Upper West Side. The fact that the food served at Ember’s restaurant is particularly hot, causing Aquarius to experience physical reactions reminiscent of eating spicy food, suggests that the Fire District is Chinatown. Ember will soon be taking over her parents’ shop, which they have worked hard for all their lives.
Always at a distance: Wade (left) and Ember in Element City
Quelle: © 2023 Disney/Pixar. All Rights Reserved.
However, Wade, who comes from a liberal, wealthy family, understands nothing about such conservative sentiments and advises Ember to instead follow her heart and go abroad for an internship as a glassblower. The fact that the fairy tale does not leave it at the well-known conflict between freedom and tradition, but brings the class question into play is just one of many clever details that make the story relevant for the present. Pixar is in its element here: Everything flows smoothly, sometimes like a gentle stream, sometimes like a wild waterfall, and the sparks are constantly flying.
The way the flame and the liquid draw ever closer together is almost as heartwarming as seeing how close the aquatic natures are built to the water. It only takes one wrong word and they cry torrents. Tearing is therefore also popular party entertainment: it is remarkable that the play partners say beautiful and touching things instead of sad things. Butterfly, half a butterfly, I love you, are words like this that most water creatures can no longer contain and start to sob loudly.
A unique venture
Elemental premiered at the Cannes Film Festival following the awards ceremony. And thus offered the culmination of two weeks of competition, which repeatedly revolved around similar topics: love affairs of older women with underage boys (“Last Summer”, “May December”), weird eating habits (“Club Zero”, “La Passion de Dodin Bouffant”) , crisis-ridden school systems (“Monster”, “Club Zero”), archaeologically motivated car chases (“La Chimera”, “Indiana Jones and the Wheel of Destiny”) or the self-reflecting theater within the theater (“Il Sol dell’avvenire”, “Asteroid City”).
The fact that this Pixar film bears little resemblance to one of the other films in the competition, be it in terms of content or style, shows what a unique risk Disney’s Pixar took again this time. At best, the erotic love affair between a successful lawyer for abuse victims and her underage stepson depicted in Catherine Breillat’s “Last Summer” comes close to the delicate affair that forms a union between fire and water.
In a few weeks “Elemental” will be in German cinemas. If it is a success, a sequel about Earth and Air, which has only played supporting roles so far, should be expected. It’s probably less about fear of contact. Until then, Pixar shows how the impossible can become possible with effort – namely creating entertainment for children and adults, combining blockbuster and art house, passion and common sense, uptown and downtown, exclusivity and mass. Not a bad closing message for a film festival.
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