The latest animation from Pixar takes a high-concept setup – a sprawling metropolis, Element City, in which the residents, all made of either fire, water, air or earth, live in strictly segregated neighborhoods – to explore a universal theme: the need for cultural acceptance and harmony. At the heart of the story is a star-crossed romance between hot-headed fire girl Ember (voiced by Leah Lewis) and sappy, sweet-natured water guy Wade (Mamoudou Athie). And perhaps it’s ludicrous to complain about the authenticity of a relationship between a woman made of flame and an entirely liquid man, but there’s little persuasive chemistry between them.
Story aside, there is no doubt that the animators have done a fantastic job when it comes to the animation of Elemental. The character design is fittingly adorable and unique. Watching the elements interact and use their elemental abilities to shape the land, specifically Ember’s use of sand to create glass sculptures, is mesmerizing.
To achieve Ember and the other Fire characters’ unique, stylized look, Pixar tapped resources at Disney Research Studios in Zurich, Switzerland, to help shape ideas into technological innovations.
Throughout the production, Marshall adds, “There was a loop between technology and the art department trying to discover what was working and what wasn’t. It was about getting a bunch of experts—a fire expert, a shading expert, an animation expert, a rigging expert, and a lighting expert—in the same room and iterating until we struck the right balance. It was about putting the different technologies together and training them to work together.” Were it not for the team’s unwavering efforts to balance realism with stylization, Bakshi concludes, “I don’t think people could connect with the characters on an emotional level.”
There’s similarly nothing in “Elemental” to recall the wondrous aesthetic imagination of modern Pixar classics like “Finding Nemo” and “Wall-E,” with the exception of a rich score by composer Thomas Newman that takes its cues from a potpourri of global musical traditions and presents a more fully formed vision of cross-cultural exchange than the film’s muddled depiction of immigrant communities. Perhaps fittingly for a film that would have more accurately been titled “When Fire Met Water…,” “Elemental” is combustible enough from minute to minute, but it evaporates from memory the second you leave the theater.
