Luca marks the 24th film on Pixar animation’s release list. Can you believe it? 24 films! It all started in 1995 with Toy Story and the rest as they say, is history.
Pixar has made a name for itself in putting out exquisitely animated films, that are ideal for the whole family to enjoy, while also making sure the scripts (on the whole) don’t let the animation down. They’re not perfect though.
The Good Dinosaur was beautifully animated (as all Pixar films tend to be) but was lacking in nearly every other area and the Cars series has been financially successful but poor from a scriptwriting perspective and lacking that classic Pixar magic.
The latest film to add to the studio’s resume is Luca and it promises more stunning animation and a fairytale-esque story not dissimilar to The Little Mermaid. But is it any good? Read on to find out.
Set in a beautiful seaside town on the Italian Riviera in the 50s and 60s, this original animated feature is a coming-of-age story about one young boy experiencing an unforgettable summer filled with gelato, pasta and endless scooter rides. Luca shares these adventures with his newfound best friend, Alberto, but all the fun is threatened by a deeply-held secret: he is a sea monster from another world just below the water’s surface.
Premise sound familiar? A sea-creature desperately wanting to experience life on the surface brings to mind Disney’s 1989 classic, The Little Mermaid, which is of course based on the Danish fairytale of the same name, released in the early 1800s. Thankfully however, that is where the similarities end.
Beautifully animated and with a story that while not causing the tear ducts to open in classic Pixar fashion, Luca still manages to impart some wisdom to the young – and young at heart. After all, this is primarily a family film, and impressionable youngsters do get a lot of their messages from movies like this.
Back to the animation for a minute – it really is some of the best we’ve seen from Pixar, and with a studio that has brought us the murky depths of Sydney harbour in Finding Nemo and the brightly-lit mind of Riley in Inside Out, that is certainly saying something.
The colourful depths of the Italian Rivera are the perfect locale to show off the talents of Pixar’s animators, and the same is true for the fishing village of Portorosso with its cobbled streets and whimsical painted houses all lending themselves perfectly to this really lovely-looking film. Luca takes inspiration from director Enrico Casarosa’s childhood in Genoa and several Pixar artists were sent to the Italian Riviera gathering research from Italian culture and environment – it shows.
The character designs too are gorgeous. If we cast our minds back to the initial trailers, it was easy to shrug the look of our band of characters as a little, well, generic. However, in the context of the film, and alongside the sea-monster aesthetics, it works really well.
From a casting perspective, Pixar couldn’t have done any better. Jacob Tremblay (who just so happens to be voicing Flounder in the upcoming live-action remake of The Little Mermaid) injects an innocence to the character of Luca that reflects that curiosity we all had as children trying something new for the first time.
Maya Rudolph and Sacha Baron Cohen also lend their voices to the film – though the latter is only in it fleetingly as an uncle from the depths of the ocean. Keep an eye out for him.
Story wise, it’s not the most original plot Pixar have ever given us, and the film’s main antagonist (if you can even call him that) is a little under-developed, but there is enough witty dialogue and under-the-sea shenanigans (herding fish rather than sheep for instance) to see you through to the end, and at only 95 minutes, that finale comes roaring up on you quicker than you would probably like.
Overall, Luca won’t be troubling the very best of Pixar’s back catalogue – that is reserved for masterpieces like Toy Story, Monsters Inc and even Soul – these three films all had an originality on their side that Luca doesn’t quite muster up.
Nevertheless, this is a great addition to the studio’s CV, and one that is sure to have massive rewatch value for kids and adults alike. With messages of self-worth and not being afraid to try new things, Luca achieves what it set out to achieve, and that’s all we can ask of it!
How can I watch Luca?
In the UK, Luca is available to watch on Disney+, and is included in your subscription cost, meaning an extra fee is not applied.
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