Captain Conroy's Pixar 40th Anniversary Marathon (Week 12)

Written by Captain Conroy

Week 1, Week 2, Week 3, Week 4, Week 5, Week 6, Week 7, Week 8, Week 9, Week 10 and Week 11 here.

And now we come to Pixar’s own under the sea tale. Yes, I already talked about Finding Nemo, but in this case I’m talking about their other under the sea tale. Luca – otherwise known as Pixar’s Studio Ghibli movie. To their credit, Pixar didn’t do too badly during this era. While Covid destroyed Onward’s chances, we still got Soul and Turning Red (coming next) and we also got this. This time around we get to visit Italy in Pixar’s imaginative storytelling form. With that being said, let’s look into it and see what they bring us for this one.

The story. Pixar return to the sea as they bring us the story of Luca, a young sea monster who has ideas of visiting the surface but the trouble is that sea monsters will not be accepted above land. But once he meets Alberto, they end up exploring land together and making friends with Giulia and together they enter the Portorosso Cup so Alberto and Luca can have a Vespa and Giulia can end the reign of terror from the town’s bully Ercole.

The story is fine I guess. It’s not exactly 100% original but hey, in this day and age, what is? But as per always, it’s not solely down to the idea you have, it’s what you do with it. And I think they worked with what they had quite well. For what is predictable, it was pretty obvious that Luca and Alberto would eventually get found out as sea monsters and there would be a fall out scene at some point here. But for originality, the way they got accepted in the end was meaningful how the whole town sees them but on the other hand, they were helping Giulia and they did win the race. And even with the more things we see later on in life and it may start becoming more predictable, yeah – but I do enjoy the kinds of stories where the outcome doesn’t always revolve around the main characters getting what they want. Like yes, Alberto did indeed get the Vespa but he willingly sold it so Luca could join Giulia in school. It’s outcomes like these that really help the story from being too overly generic.

But sadly for all that’s great for it, you still get some things where it’s like “Yeah, I bet nobody saw that coming.” like again Luca and Alberto being found out. But there’s something else which has me scratching my head. How on Earth does Ercole have such a tight grip over the town? It’s something that’s never really explained or explored upon and it’s like, “Come on, he’s just a teenager!” Furthermore to this, there’s police officers in the town for one thing. And for another, Italy has leaders of the country doesn’t it? Heck even when he’s signing up, it is stated by the host of the cup he’s too old but she still lets it slide. And it’s not like he says he’ll tell his parents or anything and yet the townsfolk allow this to happen and let him push them around.

“Pussies!”

You’re damn right Venom, a bunch of big ones too! Nevertheless it does make his comeuppance all the sweeter once it happens and you at least have the rest of the movie to enjoy as it takes a while for Ercole to show up and even then he’s not in it that much compared to Luca and the other main characters, but man that is a serious head-scratcher. The story is still enough to pass by Pixar standards at least.

The animation. What more to say? The sea looks great. They had plenty of practice with Finding Nemo and Finding Dory. But even with the sea, there is obviously more to talk about other than how the sea looks. You get skin textures looking more prominent than before, especially on close ups and you get the creative side of the character designs like the sea monster forms having scales where hair would be. Once again we see a bit more of a cartoony side as upon these rewatches I have noticed like when you get a more realistic side and a more cartoony side. Like Soul before, you get the shapely Designs and this time around it’s especially more noticeable on the mouths. You guys might know it more as the bean-mouth style. But even for it all, nothing at least looks freaky despite cartoon like designs having realistic textures. I’ve seen it happen often with characters where making them realistic makes them look so freaky.

The following image may well cause nightmares, viewer discretion is advised.

Gah!

But thankfully that’s not the case here. In fact realistic textures or no realistic textures, the characters look very charming, especially the seas monsters. Their designs are very nice and they certainly won’t freak anyone out. In addition, the speed is well done as always and creates excitement and adds to the action scenes, especially during the climax when Luca and Alberto are evading Ercole during the Portorosso Cup. The elements are well represented too, any scene in the sun looks warm and inviting, the rain looks as real as it ever does and a good usage of colours help to make a scene and not break it thankfully.

One example I can give is right here. This wouldn’t have worked as well if it was under a blue sky, but taking advantage of the sunset colours adds to this scene and I’d actually say Alberto looks a little unnerving here which really goes to show how good Pixar animators are at their job when they can make a relatively friendly looking character design look intimidating. All in all, nothing bad to say here, as per always with the animation, good job Pixar. Good job.

The characters. Naturally you always need a good cast of characters and Luca has one, at least mostly. Luca is certainly doable as a main character. He’s curious about the world above him and around him whenever he’s on land. He’s a bit timid about some things but he gradually learns to be braver and he does have a pretty sweet bond with Alberto. He and Alberto alone show how unlikely friendships can form, I mean Alberto clearly doesn’t mind sharing stuff with someone he had only just met. Alberto himself appears confident and fearless on the outside but on the inside, he admits he gets the Bruno sometimes and he bears the burden that his father left him and he’s not coming back, that’s what a good multi-layered character can do.

Guilia is one of those characters too. She’s the one who appears as Ercole’s arch enemy and she has good reasoning for it too, not just because Ercole’s a turd. Least of all it made for a lovely scene when Luca and Guilia were talking under the stars and Guilia opens up about her insecurities and why it’s important to her that she wins this. Her father Massimo is a good un’ too. He subverts some expectations like how he was naturally born without his right arm, he didn’t lose it to a sea monster like he had joked about. It also says a lot about him when he’s one who hunts sea monsters but yet he’s the first to accept Luca and Alberto. Ercole, there’s not much to say about him other than he’s a turd. Some development might have helped but he’s just such a nothing character. Cicco and Guido on the other hand have at least some hope given they turn on him in the end and one of them even steered the boat away when Ercole was going to charge Luca and Alberto. It does make you wonder why they bothered working for him in the first place though. Luca’s parents are the over-protective kind but yet they’re fun. Especially when they’re looking for Luca, those scenes were fun to watch. Our heroes are a good bunch but our villains are not but you get a good cast of characters overall in this movie.

Luca may have its generic moments but it’s by no less means bad or a mixed bag, you still have a lot you’ll be guaranteed to enjoy. The story is where most of the generic stuff lies but again there’s still plenty to enjoy, the animation is beautiful and the characters are loveable – except for Ercole.

Yeah! We’re talking about you, you ****face!

But never mind him, the rest of the characters and the animation is where the movie’s quality is at. And even for the generic side of things it certainly is not what I would call Pixar’s worst, for me it was Lightyear but I’ll see if anything changes on a rewatch but even before I get there, we have another to look at which will also focus on a main character who has two different forms...

Pixar took something perfect and painted it red!

Yeah, that punchline was obvious, someone sue me, LOL.

And now we come to the last of the streaming exclusive movies, Turning Red. On paper this was by far one of Pixar’s craziest premises I have to say. I mean how would you react if someone pitched to you about a girl who turns into a giant red panda? I know I might’ve been a bit weirded out myself, but naturally for a premise like this to work, it needs a good execution. And given this is Pixar we’re talking about, let’s see how they do it. Least of all, it’s funny isn’t it how that’s now the second movie in a row about a character who has two different forms eh?

The story. It’s all about our girl Meilin Lee who has recently turned 13 and is very much at the top of her game. She has good friends, she’s successful at school and she does a good job helping her mother run the family temple. However it’s also turning 13 when Mei discovers something particularly interesting about her family and herself, her family have the ability to turn into giant red pandas by feel of strong emotions, so Mei has to navigate a new chapter of life as it’s now her turn, let alone her heroes 4 Town coming to Toronto on the same night of her ritual to contain the red panda spirit.

The story has a lot going for it. Firstly, yes Mei does a good job at helping her mother and being her perfect Mei-Mei. Although in this case it’s a little too perfect. Yes, it’s good to make your parents proud, but you shouldn’t loose yourself while doing it and this is something that’s very much touched upon in this movie which leads to being the ultimate life lesson about toxic perfectionism. Yes, that is very much a thing before anybody asks. And it’s not just with Mei either, her mother Ming is a victim of it as well which adds a lot of depth to the story. It especially digs deep whenever Mei goes to the astral plane and does not complete the ritual, especially the second time when she encounters Ming as a teenager sobbing. Shows sometimes you don’t need a villain in the flesh per say even if Ming in red panda form is a representation of such, sometimes an antagonistic force is all you need and in this case the toxic perfectionism is that.

We have the subversions as well, one example is often in stories, the father can be a bit of a buffoon but Mei’s father Jin is not. In fact he’s even in my favourite scene in this movie where he and Mei have a heart-to-heart. It added a lot of backstory and gave Mei a very insightful… well… insight. And if the toxic perfectionism being the antagonistic force wasn’t enough, it’s funny we get the adult jokes in this movie as Mei’s red panda could also be seen as a strong visual metaphor for what happens when we enter puberty. Like the panda is where everything changes. It’s pretty clever stuff this I say, this is a classic example as to how you take one of the wackiest premises you can think off and somehow find a way to make it work. The story is one of the deepest and has one of the strongest messages behind it in any of Pixar’s movies to date. It often seems that people get this movie wrong and don’t get the message behind it. But I am here to tell you the cast iron fact that the main take away is this: don’t let toxic perfectionism get the better of you. I mean yeah, Mei still gets to keep the red panda and defies her parents along the way but it doesn’t take a Sherlock to see the true message, especially when you rewatch all of Mei’s family except for her reseal their spirits.

The animation still has a cartoonish like style but not quite to the same extent as Soul which we looked at last time. The characters each have their own unique kind of shape to them but not quite as shapely like as Soul if that makes sense. You get the whimsical side to things and the realistic side as per usual of any Pixar movie post Cars. For the realistic side, you get hair textures and realistic clothing textures as usual. For one side Mei’s fantasies are indeed very whimsical but when she’s doing her homework and doodling at the same time, it’s amazing how real the pencil lines look. Then you get the food, if you thought Ratatouille made food look good, Turning Red genuinely makes it look like you could just eat it then and there. It never ceases to amaze me even in the day and age we are in now just how real some substances can look in these movies.

Like genuinely, this food looks so flavoursome and delicious, I can even imagine what it must taste like and it’s one thing to animate food, but when it looks as delicious as this, this is a whole new level. But it’s not just the realistic side, it’s the whimsical side as well which really helps give this movie a good look. Mei’s fantasies, anytime she brings the red panda out. and of course the astral plane. For a place that features a lot of bamboo trees, they certainly made it look very pretty and it really helps to show the movie’s creative side. As per usual to the high Pixar standard, the movie has a great usage of colour palettes, my particular favourite was the red tinge that was added to everything when the blood moon came in. I mean it’s as basic as it comes with the fact it’s called a blood moon but they really made it effective and it adds so much to the ritual, it wouldn’t have worked as well without it. The animation is highly creative in this movie, but hey, by this point, pretty much every Pixar movie is. It’s like I could have a Pixar movie where the story isn’t as strong or the characters are completely loathsome, but I can never have anything bad to say about the animation.

But on that subject, are these characters loathsome? Let’s see. Mei is the one to give a lot of credit to, she has a lot to live up to and she’s only thirteen. But yet she learns along the way about embracing herself panda or no panda and she learns she can certainly make her family proud, but just not to loose herself while doing it. Along the way, she’s absolutely loveable and is a joy to watch and you certainly feel good for her in the end when she finds a perfect balance between herself and her panda side. Her best friends, well it’s easy to see why they’re her best friends as they truly have her back through and through and it really says a lot when they help her keep her panda under control rather than her parents. Mariam is like the leader of them, Priya is essentially Pixar’s equivalent to Wednesday Addams and that’s what makes her my favourite of Mei’s friends. And Abby? Well, we love Abby, what’s not to love about that hammy and excitable personality?

I said earlier how there’s a lot more to Jin, Mei’s father than there seems and that makes him another favourite character of mine for that reason. Ming was one of those characters where upon a first watch I didn’t much care for her but on a rewatch, it was then I started realising things like how sympathetic she could be seen as for what happened between her and her own mother and how for that reason the toxic perfectionism she strives Mei towards for shows. She causes a lot of Mei’s humiliation in this movie yes, but it’s still easy to see that she cares for her really and she’s not entirely a lost cause as she learns and develops by the end of the movie. And well, her character is a lot more than can be said for Tyler’s. Yes, he has some depth to him like he’s a 4-Town fan as well and that leads to him becoming friends with the people he once bullied, but it’s not enough. For me it’s too little, too late and well, I can assure you that me and any bully of mine didn’t automatically become friends over the same interests and usually Pixar can do better than this, however I do bless them for trying to make him a less one dimensional bully. But nevertheless we do have a loveable and interesting cast of characters, especially the Lee family.

Turning Red on paper is Pixar’s craziest premise or at least one of the craziest but yet Pixar working their magic managed to take a crazy concept and made it work. The story is very multi-layered, the animation is fun and very nice to look at and the characters each have their own level of depth and shining personalities. There is more to this movie than one may think and it’s a classic example as to why a book should never be judged by it’s cover. There’s plenty of funny moments to break up some of the more mature moments. Like I say, people get this movie wrong but once again like I emphasised earlier in this marathon, all I can recommend is you watch this for yourself and make up your own mind about it. I can at least recommend it highly like I can most of the others.

So that's that one and join me next time as I review the last three movies, Lightyear, Elemental and Elio. See you then guys.

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