Elemental
Year: 2023
Directed by: Peter Sohn
Starring: Mamoudou Athie, Ronnie del Carmen, Leah Lewis & Shila Ommi
Runtime: 109 mins
BBFC: PG
Published: 08/08/23
Directed by: Peter Sohn
Starring: Mamoudou Athie, Ronnie del Carmen, Leah Lewis & Shila Ommi
Runtime: 109 mins
BBFC: PG
Published: 08/08/23
I don’t think it’s a secret that Pixar’s more recent output of films has not been close to the quality the studio was putting out a decade ago. Whilst there have been recent successes in films like Soul and Turning Red, these have been significantly overshadowed by the misfires of films like Onward and Lightyear, and even those wins don’t feel as ingenious as films like Finding Nemo or The Incredibles did in the early 00’s.
The studio needs something special, and not just another Toy Story sequel. An original IP that can deliver heartfelt Pixar drama with gorgeous and highly stylised visuals that push the medium of computer animation forward. But instead, we get Elemental.
Ember (Leah Lewis) is a first-generation immigrant to Element City. As a fire element, Ember and her parents, Burnie (Ronnie del Carmen) and Cinder (Shula Ommi), have faced xenophobia their whole lives, and effectively started the community they live in on the run-down outskirts of the city.
Ember is due to take over her father’s business, but when disaster strikes and the basement of the shop floods, the building is classified as dangerous by Wade (Mamoudou Archie), a city water inspector.
Unless Ember can trace the source of the problem and fix it before the end of the week, her family business will be closed, and they will lose their home.
With the help of Wade, Ember must fix the city’s leak, and along the way she discovers that there’s a side to her that she never knew.
The studio needs something special, and not just another Toy Story sequel. An original IP that can deliver heartfelt Pixar drama with gorgeous and highly stylised visuals that push the medium of computer animation forward. But instead, we get Elemental.
Ember (Leah Lewis) is a first-generation immigrant to Element City. As a fire element, Ember and her parents, Burnie (Ronnie del Carmen) and Cinder (Shula Ommi), have faced xenophobia their whole lives, and effectively started the community they live in on the run-down outskirts of the city.
Ember is due to take over her father’s business, but when disaster strikes and the basement of the shop floods, the building is classified as dangerous by Wade (Mamoudou Archie), a city water inspector.
Unless Ember can trace the source of the problem and fix it before the end of the week, her family business will be closed, and they will lose their home.
With the help of Wade, Ember must fix the city’s leak, and along the way she discovers that there’s a side to her that she never knew.
I don’t know what it is about Peter Sohn, but the two films he has written and directed, The Good Dinosaur and now Elemental, are massively disappointing. Where The Good Dinosaur had amazing visuals, potentially the best Pixar has ever produced to this day, it had little to offer in terms of story beyond what a short film would provide. Elemental meanwhile offers up one far too many stories in a plot that is largely confused about what it wants to say, and the visuals are definitely interesting but do not break new ground.
The main plot of Elemental concerns itself with Ember trying to save her father’s shop whilst battling against a system that is inherently stacked against her. This is the most compelling story the film has to offer, but it unfortunately either gets overpowered by the less interesting and awkwardly integrated love story, or by the fact that the story consistently places Ember as the party responsible for her problems, when in fact the issue is the lack of upkeep that Element City seems to place in its services.
The whole plot is made moot by Wade’s boss, Gale (Wendi McLendon-Covey), because she states that the issue stems from a structural problem in the city’s canal system that just hasn’t been located or fixes yet, and we see that’s the case. Yet the plot consistently makes it out to be Ember’s temper problems that caused this in the first place. The reality is that the issue is caused by the city not putting enough money towards maintenance and as such the Fire people that make up Ember’s community suffer. This could have made an interesting commentary on how social welfare often isn’t afforded to those who actually need it, but instead the plot places the blame on Ember for getting angry and breaking a pipe in her basement…despite the water supposedly having been shut off to her neighbourhood due to them all being Fire elements. It really angers me that Pixar have placed the blame on the innocent individual, rather than addressing the broken system, because it’s the only way they could think of giving Ember a character arc.
So, when the main plot has that much of a problem that it seems to actively ignore, the question then becomes why bother focusing on anything else. Love of course!! Forced love I should say. Yes, Ember and Wade begin to fall for each other because Ember seems to think that Wade awakens new feelings within her. I’d argue this isn’t true, he does help her realise that there’s more to life than overtaking your parents’ business out of a feeling of duty, which in turn makes Ember realise her potential in more artistic avenues, but this feels like such a studio landed addition rather than a natural extension of the plot that you can’t help but roll your eyes in disgust. Ember proves herself to be a self-sufficient protagonist, so why it takes her falling in love in a Romeo & Juliet style forbidden romance to realise that she has ambitions feels like a kick in the teeth.
The main plot of Elemental concerns itself with Ember trying to save her father’s shop whilst battling against a system that is inherently stacked against her. This is the most compelling story the film has to offer, but it unfortunately either gets overpowered by the less interesting and awkwardly integrated love story, or by the fact that the story consistently places Ember as the party responsible for her problems, when in fact the issue is the lack of upkeep that Element City seems to place in its services.
The whole plot is made moot by Wade’s boss, Gale (Wendi McLendon-Covey), because she states that the issue stems from a structural problem in the city’s canal system that just hasn’t been located or fixes yet, and we see that’s the case. Yet the plot consistently makes it out to be Ember’s temper problems that caused this in the first place. The reality is that the issue is caused by the city not putting enough money towards maintenance and as such the Fire people that make up Ember’s community suffer. This could have made an interesting commentary on how social welfare often isn’t afforded to those who actually need it, but instead the plot places the blame on Ember for getting angry and breaking a pipe in her basement…despite the water supposedly having been shut off to her neighbourhood due to them all being Fire elements. It really angers me that Pixar have placed the blame on the innocent individual, rather than addressing the broken system, because it’s the only way they could think of giving Ember a character arc.
So, when the main plot has that much of a problem that it seems to actively ignore, the question then becomes why bother focusing on anything else. Love of course!! Forced love I should say. Yes, Ember and Wade begin to fall for each other because Ember seems to think that Wade awakens new feelings within her. I’d argue this isn’t true, he does help her realise that there’s more to life than overtaking your parents’ business out of a feeling of duty, which in turn makes Ember realise her potential in more artistic avenues, but this feels like such a studio landed addition rather than a natural extension of the plot that you can’t help but roll your eyes in disgust. Ember proves herself to be a self-sufficient protagonist, so why it takes her falling in love in a Romeo & Juliet style forbidden romance to realise that she has ambitions feels like a kick in the teeth.
Beyond the problems I have with the story, Elemental doesn’t deliver either in terms of its presentation. Whilst Lightyear certainly didn’t have the best narrative, it did at least deliver some of the best 3D computer animated visuals of all time, but Elemental can’t decide on its art direction, let alone ensure that the visuals look crisp.
Stylistically it evokes a lot of Zootopia vibes, which can be said for the story too, but I think it’s most evident in the way Elemental looks. The city themes districts around the elements that inhabit them, but we only really get to spend time in the Fire and Water districts. Water being a more affluent area with tall glass skyscrapers and water features dotted around everywhere, and Fire being run down, dry, and just a bit all over the place. The character models generally look a bit so-so, the animation of the Water people draws a lot from the likes of Hank from Finding Dory, with extremely fluid anatomy. Meanwhile the Fire people almost appear to be a mix of 2D and 3D animation, and their bodies break down when in contact with water. They’re neat touches but the individual character models don’t feel inspired or truly unique, they’re all just variations on the same feature set.
I wasn’t blown away by the sound either. None of the performances particularly stand out, likely because they’re contending with a script that reads like it was written by a child, and Thomas Newman’s score doesn’t evoke much of an emotional response at all.
Whilst the argument can be made that Elemental is on par with the majority of kids animation, and as such Pixar’s worst is still in line with many of their competitors best; with the significant jump in quality recently from the likes of Dreamworks, Sony, and even Illumination, Elemental simply is not good enough. I’m sure kids will like it, but I’m not exactly keen on the idea of kids being taught the warped and incorrect moral values Elemental offers up. I’d give it a hard miss.
Stylistically it evokes a lot of Zootopia vibes, which can be said for the story too, but I think it’s most evident in the way Elemental looks. The city themes districts around the elements that inhabit them, but we only really get to spend time in the Fire and Water districts. Water being a more affluent area with tall glass skyscrapers and water features dotted around everywhere, and Fire being run down, dry, and just a bit all over the place. The character models generally look a bit so-so, the animation of the Water people draws a lot from the likes of Hank from Finding Dory, with extremely fluid anatomy. Meanwhile the Fire people almost appear to be a mix of 2D and 3D animation, and their bodies break down when in contact with water. They’re neat touches but the individual character models don’t feel inspired or truly unique, they’re all just variations on the same feature set.
I wasn’t blown away by the sound either. None of the performances particularly stand out, likely because they’re contending with a script that reads like it was written by a child, and Thomas Newman’s score doesn’t evoke much of an emotional response at all.
Whilst the argument can be made that Elemental is on par with the majority of kids animation, and as such Pixar’s worst is still in line with many of their competitors best; with the significant jump in quality recently from the likes of Dreamworks, Sony, and even Illumination, Elemental simply is not good enough. I’m sure kids will like it, but I’m not exactly keen on the idea of kids being taught the warped and incorrect moral values Elemental offers up. I’d give it a hard miss.