Elementals (PIxar)

For most people when discussing a piece of art or entertainment, that preceding three-word sentence is their way of damning it with faint praise. Anyone who's read my reviews for a decent amount of time knows that's actually my highest compliment.

I had skepticism going in. I hate the fact that most Pixar movies are created around a bizarre high-concept, and the story and characters are secondary to it. Cars is the most egregious example, but truthfully it's been a problem for its films starting from Toy Story, and while some of them have broken out of that mold, most of them are still in it. And do you know drives me nuts? This is a problem for Dreamworks and Illumination too. For computer animated films, the setting seems to be created first. And I don't agree with that kind of storytelling, and it often doesn't lead anywhere interesting. It did for this movie, but as a rule I don't approve.

What's fascinating is this never really seemed to a problem when most animated films were hand-drawn. Most 2-D films before Toy Story were story-based instead of premised-based. I don't see why the change in technology made studios tell their stories in an entirely different way from what had worked for decades, but maybe they believed that's all people are currently interested in.

I like and dislike the allegory of racial tensions. If you were to use it to say "racism is dumb for humanity, and even fire and water can see that and work around it" yeah, that's a good message. But I worry that the film might actually be right on some level that elements can't or shouldn't mix under most circumstances. There are legit reasons in this Universe why different types of people fear each other and consider those outside of their tribe annoying at best, and dangerous at worst. And I hope that message is not what's going on because real racism is an artificial construct with no factual basis in reality. It is such a huge problem in society and probably the root of all of our current problems. We could fix a lot of problems in the world if we elected people willing to fix those problems. Because racism exists, we can never seem to get those people elected, or at least enough of them to help solve the problems at hand. The allegory of the film is questionable because for this Universe, racists are right on some level. I don't entirely approve of an allegory that ever gives bigots that much. Even set in a fictional fantasy universe.

What's interesting about the racial allegories to me is Wade's family is portrayed as especially kind and tolerant to Ember. And they say and do a few racist things well-meaning people who want to be allies do in our Universe. Like having little kids underfoot who embarrassingly say racist things (and in this case try and see if Ember is easy to kill). Or the dad telling her she's very articulate. Part of the reason I'm leery about the racial allegories being raised is because it really does sound credible in the reactions. It's the subtext that's the problem, not the actual portrayal.

Cars was SO hard for me to justify in my mind because there is no way that world should have evolved the way it did without people with hands and opposable thumbs. I question Nature's Grand Design for the world of Elemental City too. But because the characters have hands and can pick things up, it could work on paper in real-life, if not in practice.

If Ember and her dad did not do the bowing thing at the end of the movie I would have thought a lot less of it. I was almost relieved it was called back. It was totally necessary. The narrative demanded it.

Ember is still kind of a hard character to like sometimes. All of the problems in the first half of the film were entirely of her own making. But she's getting there and a work in progress.

It's a movie without a specific villain that still explores right and wrong, and gives one food for ethical thought. I don't approve of the way Pixar creates its stories. But sometimes it works out for the best. This is one of the better high-concept executions. Not because I believe the reality of the world. But I believe the reality of the people in the world. And that's always been more important to me. 4 stars.