ELIO
Starring: Yonas Kibreab, Zoe Saldaña, Remy Edgerly, Brandon Moon, Brad Garrett, Jameela Jamil, and Brendan Hunt
Director: Madeline Sharafian, Domee Shi, and Adrian Molina
NICK
While Pixar's recent offerings have felt geared more towards us (the generation who grew up on Toy Story), Elio feels like a departure from that. Whether it's the villain who feels intentionally less frightening, the younger, child-like qualities of Elio (Yonas Kibreab), or the overall inoffensiveness of the film, this feels best geared for four to eight-year-olds. You still get beautiful, dynamic visuals and the underlying message of belonging that you’d expect, but this is a film made specifically for the little ones, and though that’s not always Pixar’s norm, there’s nothing wrong with that.
ADRIANO
With a movie like Elio, I'd typically just forget it and move on since it gave me no real reason to think about it after the credits. There was nothing I hated, but also nothing I loved. But leaving the theatre, all I could think about was how this completely lacked creativity or sincerity, the two winning ingredients for Pixar's best. Maybe I'd care less if it wasn't Pixar, but besides really great animation, and despite the movie insisting it offers a lot, I can safely say Elio will fade from memory by next week.
AMARÚ
Pixar would have me watch a movie with big “FTK” energy on my second official day of summer break. But even through the frustrations my teacher brain couldn’t escape, I found Elio to be wondrous, imaginative, and lovely. Its tremendous visuals magnificently bolster the creative extraterrestrial world, and while this does skew more kid-friendly, the themes of loneliness, communication, belonging, and resilience ring true for adults and children alike. Maybe even more for adults who have to be resilient for both themselves and their less-equipped children. That last bit was not something I was prepared to tear up over on DAY TWO OF BREAK!
BODE
My relationship with Pixar isn’t what it once was, but I went into their latest film, Elio, supportive in that it’d be another original winner in their filmography. The results are…fine. It’s quite heartfelt in its exploration of loneliness and belonging, and some of the world building (achieved through stunning animation) can be pretty fun. I just wish it weren’t so busy and formulaic, but I suppose that’s what happens when you have three authorial visions duelling with each other over how this story should be told. Still, it’s cute enough that I can’t really come down hard on it.
ROBERT
While watching Elio, I couldn’t shake the feeling that this was a movie shown years later than the heyday for this kind of story, and then I thought about science fiction in the 1980’s; my mind went to Flight of the Navigator. So, we have the standard mid-tier Pixar template: unpopular protagonist with parental issues, looking for identity and belonging outside of their current situation, and it is paired with classic, Disney sci-fi storytelling. As such, it doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but it makes you think about trauma and life-resetting expectations in a cute, succinct package. Crying may happen, but not uncontrollably like with Coco or Toy Story 3.
