CaptainAmerica
Well-Known Member
Coco was amazing and universal.
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Elemental (Pixar - June 2023)
- Thread starter DCBaker
- Start date
CaptainAmerica
Well-Known Member
Disney+ didn't doom Doctor Strange or The Way of Water.Pixar's weakest box office opening ever. The Disney+ curse they created for themselves is real, it would seem.
This isn't a Disney+ curse, this is a "making sucky movies" curse.
TalkingHead
Well-Known Member
Agreed with everything you said but especially your comments about the arena scene.
I was trying to figure out why they had Ember approach the boss lady at a sporting event. At best, it’s an awkward situation if you’re trying to create sympathy for her character. Seems like most people would find that annoying, to be asked about work while attending an entertainment event outside business hours. Is it just so they can show Wade “connecting” with the crowd? If so, there have to be a hundred better ways to show he’s a better communicator than she is.
It’s the kind of scene you’d expect from a lesser animation studio because logically, emotionally it doesn’t make sense. And there’s no genuine pay off to having them meet the boss lady in this context.
Wade’s character has a similar underdeveloped B-movie quality. They gave him no real personality except for being an overly sensitive guy who’s also a too-earnest positivity coach. It’s like they took the soft millennial guy stereotypes and rolled them into this shape-shifting blob character. The romance just didn’t work for me because of his half.
BlakeW39
Well-Known Member
not yet
it's mostly this... BUT part of the issue is that films make slightly less now than they did pre-pandemic. consumer interest and market dynamics have just changed due to streaming. Disney's main issue is mediocre product quality and brand fatigue/disillusionment... but for the market as a whole, theatres aren't what they were in 2018–2019.. nothing really is
BlakeW39
Well-Known Member
Agree with all of this.
We went to see Elemental today (in 3D even - so nobody can argue we weren't rooting for it) and I have to say, I went in wanting to like it and walked out wishing it had been a better movie than it ended up being.
The design and animation was of course, beautiful.
Everything else?
Meh.
While I think they did a pretty solid job with Ember's character and her family, Wade and his ilk felt like a weird bad parody. Honestly, the way his side of the love story played out, I wouldn't be surprised if his character went through a similar "love" story with someone else every other week. He came across as kind of a love bomber.
A walking body of water with the apparent depth of a puddle.
I understand they were playing up the opposites and all of that but how they demonstrate him "connecting" with others like in the stadium felt cringy and forced.
The idea that they went from meeting in bad circumstances to "true love" in less than a week was also stretching the boundaries of credibility.
How the boss went from difficult to suddenly a buddy? That also didn't track unless Wade really just uses empathy to manipulate others.
Those are just examples.
The various messages being sent also seemed a little bit heavy-handed, to me, too.
They weren't bad messages but more and more, Disney's and Pixar's movies seem to be more about the message than the entertainment and if I wanted to watch an after school special, I'd start watching broadcast TV again - not trekking out to a theater.
Unlike Strange World that I feel would have needed a significant re-write to have saved, this one feels like it could have been a great movie if it had gone through a tougher internal review process.
That what saved Wade in the end was his most melodramatic eye-rolling trait made it feel like that whole point about him and his "people" was forced in there just to have that be able to happen in the end.
They could have gone with how steam - a natural result of fire and water - isn't the end for either of them and how it cooled her without killing her because her "flame" was too strong to be extinguished that way (great metaphor to address her coming to terms with her spirit and individuality while taming her temper) while also showing him he could be more resilient (the heat doesn't kill him but transforms him) and not such a pushover. Them being all about messages, it could have been a solid message about the need for both yin and yang and how everything is stronger with both.
The big message of the film was diversity and finding beauty in what makes us different, right? Wouldn't a melting-pot solution like that have driven that message home?
Instead, they went with the solution being that he needed to cry some more.
It didn't feel earned.
I felt let down, not because it was an awful movie but because it felt like it could have been a great movie if - I don't know?
Someone else directed?
That's probably too harsh so I'd say, if someone or a group of someone's with some distance was providing the brutal internal critiquing that Pixar was once legendary for putting all their movies through before letting the public see them.
It's feeling like a lot of these newer movies haven't been getting that kind of love to me.
The ending was emotional but like Wade's ability to "connect", it felt more like shallow manipulation than what I'd at one time come to expect from Pixar movies.
Pete Doctor is already subtly blaming how audiences have been "trained" to watch Pixar on Disney+. I think that's completely the wrong takeaway. Every movie finds it's way on to some streaming service sooner than later now days.
That's not why people with kids are taking them to other animated movies and avoiding Pixar and Disney's latest releases.
We went to see it in a theater on opening weekend. I wouldn't recommend anyone else spend money to see it that way and D+ grooming has nothing to do with why.
If anyone were to ask me, I'd say if you haven't seen Across the Spiderverse yet, go spend your money on that one - it deserves it.
Wait until you can see this one for "free".
I'd preface this with a spoiler warning ^^^
mickEblu
Well-Known Member
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MrPromey
Well-Known Member
I don't think a project being personal to a director is bad.
It can certainly add a degree of authenticity.
I think the problem is if it becomes an auteur-like project where others don't come in with a critical eye.
That's what feels like has been lacking recently to me.
MrPromey
Well-Known Member
Will edit for that - thank you!
TP2000
Well-Known Member
I should have clarified that my comment was about Pixar and WDAS movies in particular. And since both of those studios now create films that are nearly impossible to tell apart, I lump them together, as I imagine many average 2020's consumers do.
Lightyear flopped, Strange World was a historic mega bomb, and now Elemental looks like it's going to slot somewhere between those two options. At best, a Lightyear style average flop.
And yet both of those animation studios spend $150 to $200 Million on each film to get there? Not sustainable.
MrPromey
Well-Known Member
And that's the kind of thing where an experienced story teller needed to step in and say "This isn't worth it for that gag. We need a better way to sell his connection to others - it's a fun idea and we'll do voice-over animatics of this scene for the bluray extras so it won't be completely lost, though."
mickEblu
Well-Known Member
The scene wasn’t my favorite but it didn’t really bother me. But to your point there were definitely better ways to move the story forward.
MrPromey
Well-Known Member
This makes me think of a Hot Ones: First We Feast episode featuring Tenacious D that I just watched. (it's old but it was new to me)
They were asked about their worst live performance and without hesitation, they both know exactly which one. Jack black talks about how bad it was going but then he spots one guy in the very back who really seemed to be into it... then he realized what the guy was mouthing.
BlakeW39
Well-Known Member
as with all things... I believe there is a balance.
on one hand, you gotta let artists tell the stories that they want to tell. otherwise you get a product made by committee that isn't really any good.
but on the other you need a film that actually appeals to your audience.. because you're making the film for them.
this ties in to a lot of problems with storytelling today, and this whole push to "subvert expectations." people have expectations of a product that they are paying for.. if you buy a wrench, and the store clerk gives you a hammer to subvert the expectations of what you are buying... you'll probably be pi$$ed
same thing with a movie. there's leeway for surprise, but when you pay for a Star Wars movie, you expect a Star Wars movie. Same thing for a [insert comic book character] movie. Even videogames like The Last of Us Part 2. Subverting expectations to give them a product they don't want and one you misled them to think they were getting, warrants backlash.
Elemental isn't that. Elemental isn't flopping because it wasn't made for a broad audience. It's flopping because it was percieved as unspectacular by general audiences and because Disney/Pixar as a brand has less draw now than it did in the past. Plus post-covid theatre draw. Plus a crowded lineup of competition.
mickEblu
Well-Known Member
I’ve taken my son to see pretty much every major animated movie that’s come out in the past year and I think I liked Elemental more than just about all of them. Mario and Puss n Boots were both fun but I think I was more emotionally engaged with Elemental. I also think it might have more repeat value.
I definitely like Elemental more than Paws Of Fury, Luck, Minions and DC League of Pets although all those movies had their moments I don’t remember being as engaged from start to finish. Again, Ive only see them all once so there might be some recency bias. It’s also way better than Turning Red and Lightyear. Better than Luca. Might be a toss up with Soul.
It has a 90% on rotten tomatoes. I think the issue is that they haven’t adjusted their budgets to the new world we live in. It seems like it’s going to be tough for an original animated movie to be box office smash these days. That or just don’t have them on D+ until 6 months after they re released in theatres.
I definitely like Elemental more than Paws Of Fury, Luck, Minions and DC League of Pets although all those movies had their moments I don’t remember being as engaged from start to finish. Again, Ive only see them all once so there might be some recency bias. It’s also way better than Turning Red and Lightyear. Better than Luca. Might be a toss up with Soul.
It has a 90% on rotten tomatoes. I think the issue is that they haven’t adjusted their budgets to the new world we live in. It seems like it’s going to be tough for an original animated movie to be box office smash these days. That or just don’t have them on D+ until 6 months after they re released in theatres.
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TalkingHead
Well-Known Member
Since this is bound to come up at some point:
Well, at least minor this time.
So you don't actually want to address the point I'm making about something being personal to the director.
That's cool, I'm bored of talking about it too.
And Luca's story was also universal.
MrPromey
Well-Known Member
That's the frustrating part, to me. It was rendered beautifully. The concept wasn't bad. It could have been a really great movie. Plenty of story elements worked. This wasn't a Good Dinosaur train wreak. It could have been way better than it was without a lot of changes.
There is this great interview with Ed Catmull from 2008 taking about how Pixar handled their creative process in those days.
It feels like something significant has changed from that process for them to be making the movies they are these days and having seen Luck, I don't think it's just the absence of John Lasater.
I don't know what it is but I hope they figure it out.
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mickEblu
Well-Known Member
I still don’t understand how they think this will get more people in seats when it does the opposite. I think Disney shot their shot too early with Lightyear and Strange World and are still experiencing the fall out.
Who the heck cares!!!! Would anyone even have known that if the voice actress wasn't excited and didn't tweet that?
Are you all that scared of the term non-binary that if a character that is literally water doesn't identify as male or female it will stop you from seeing the movie?
HIDE THE CHILDREN!!!