Review | Cannes 2023: Elemental movie review – Pixar animated fantasy voiced by Leah Lewis and Mamoudou Athie is amusingly frothy
- Leah Lewis and Mamoudou Athie play two elements – fire and water – who are thrown together, but can’t be together; fire and water don’t mix
- This fantasy story looks good and the leads have great chemistry - ultimately it’s a feel-good romance for adults and children alike
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3.5/5 stars
The bright sparks at animation house Pixar certainly know how to establish a world and so it goes with Elemental, a frothy fantasy where characters made from fire, water, earth and air mingle.
“This shop is my Dad’s dream,” says Ember, who is being geared up to take it over one day.
The only issue is, Ember is rather combustible in front of difficult customers. One day, her temper gets the better of her and she seemingly causes some damage in the basement.
What’s more, one of the “water” people, Wade Ripple (Mamoudou Athie), is somehow sucked into their environment. He’s not sure how, but it’s Ember’s bad luck that he’s a city inspector and immediately decides to give them citations for various building infringements, which could result in the whole business being shut down.
Ember begs him otherwise, and the kindly Wade seems inclined to help, although it will involve some schmoozing with his boss first. Really, though, all these plot mechanics are just a device to bring Ember and Wade into each other’s orbit.
“Fire and water cannot be together,” we’re told – she could vapourise him, he could extinguish her – and never the twain should meet. Can they somehow work it out? Certainly, Bernie would “boil” Wade alive if he knew that he was romancing his daughter.
The characterisation of Wade and his family is also very amusing. These water-based figures are constantly in floods of tears; they even play “The Crying Game”, to see if any of them can hold in their sobs just for a minute.
The animation is also packed with gorgeous detail. It’s true that after all that lovely world-building, the film flags in the middle section, but there are moments of true beauty in Elemental that will appeal to incurable romantics everywhere.
