Elemental wears its heart on its sleeve. It should. It is a romantic comedy, after all, and the rom-com isn’t a genre known – or valued – for subtlety. The rom-com is a genre where we want and expect certain things to happen in a certain order, for characters to say certain things at a certain time. It’s a ritualistic genre which encourages us to believe that love can cross any divide and make anyone a better, happier person. If that sounds boring, remember, ritual is the necessary condition to work magic.
Rom-coms vary only in the facts of the divide between two people. Are the two will-be lovers at initially at odds because of class, culture, race, or mere temperament? Maybe they are separated by time, as in some of the higher concept rom-coms. But once the particulars of the rom-com are established, the rest of the story rolls out predictably. As in all rituals, routine is the canvas on which individual artists can improvise. As long as they stay true to the basic form of the genre, anything is permissible.
Elemental pushes the limits of permissibility, delightfully. This is a world where the four classical elements—water, earth, air, and fire—are anthropomorphized and divided into distinct cultural groups. This sets the stage for countless clever visual gags. Even if the characters weren’t compelling, this would still be a fun world to spend a couple of hours in. Elemental is directed by Pixar’s Peter Sohn, the director who previously made Partly Cloudy, the short about the cloud who tends to make dangerous animals for its stork to deliver, and The Good Dinosaur, the Pixar film you most likely haven’t seen but which I love in large part because it is so weird. His sense of humor tends toward the absurd. In Elemental the visual humor is closer to cuddly than anything Sohn has done before, but it’s still never quite what you expect.
But back to the rom-com. Elemental is about a fire woman named Ember. She’s the child of the first fire immigrants to Element City. Her parents open a store which serves as a cultural center for the wave, no, blast of fire people who immigrate to the city after them. Her parents expect her to take over the store when they retire. She wants this too, maybe. She is a serious woman prone to bursts of rage. She meet-cutes Wade, a water guy with a heart as big as the ocean, and all the typical rom-com shenanigans follow, just with the aspects of their one-element natures used for both laugh-inducing and lovely effect.
So yes, Elemental manages to divide our would-be lovers by class, culture, temperament, and even basic chemistry. Culture and temperament are the most important factors in their difficult-to-make-work romance, but the others are definitely there too. Sometimes it feels like too much. The plot that runs under the romance has to do with a leak that threatens to flood the part of town where all the fire people live, and it’s the weakest part of the film, but everything else is so magical I didn’t really care. The film is always beautiful to look at. Visually, it is consistently witty. The voice-acting is superb. It reminded me most of the films of Nora Ephron and Jacques Demy. When you’re talking resplendent, modern romances and smart rom-coms, you don’t get any better than that.
Ultimately, I think Elemental’s risk in packing in so many divides between its lovers is a strength. I am not a child of immigrants like director Peter Sohn, on whose upbringing the story is based, so I do not resonate with that part of Ember’s story, though I’m sure many audience members will. I am an emotional cry baby though, and my wife is more on the fiery side, so that dynamic spoke to me. Maybe you and your partner are separated by class or cultural background. If so, I reckon those parts of the story will hit home with you. The best Pixar movies have given us language to talk about things we didn’t know how to talk about before. Elemental is that kind of vocabulary-expanding film.
Elemental isn’t perfect, but it’s a big swing with a big heart, and it connects way more than it misses. And every moment feels genuine, like it’s rooted in someone real life experience, like every storytelling decision was an act of love. It’s magic.
Elemental wears its heart on its sleeve. It should. It is a romantic comedy, after all, and the rom-com isn’t a genre known – or valued – for subtlety. The rom-com is a genre where we want and expect certain things to happen in a certain order, for characters to say certain things at a certain time. It’s a ritualistic genre which encourages us to believe that love can cross any divide and make anyone a better, happier person. If that sounds boring, remember, ritual is the necessary condition to work magic.
Rom-coms vary only in the facts of the divide between two people. Are the two will-be lovers at initially at odds because of class, culture, race, or mere temperament? Maybe they are separated by time, as in some of the higher concept rom-coms. But once the particulars of the rom-com are established, the rest of the story rolls out predictably. As in all rituals, routine is the canvas on which individual artists can improvise. As long as they stay true to the basic form of the genre, anything is permissible.
Elemental pushes the limits of permissibility, delightfully. This is a world where the four classical elements—water, earth, air, and fire—are anthropomorphized and divided into distinct cultural groups. This sets the stage for countless clever visual gags. Even if the characters weren’t compelling, this would still be a fun world to spend a couple of hours in. Elemental is directed by Pixar’s Peter Sohn, the director who previously made Partly Cloudy, the short about the cloud who tends to make dangerous animals for its stork to deliver, and The Good Dinosaur, the Pixar film you most likely haven’t seen but which I love in large part because it is so weird. His sense of humor tends toward the absurd. In Elemental the visual humor is closer to cuddly than anything Sohn has done before, but it’s still never quite what you expect.
But back to the rom-com. Elemental is about a fire woman named Ember. She’s the child of the first fire immigrants to Element City. Her parents open a store which serves as a cultural center for the wave, no, blast of fire people who immigrate to the city after them. Her parents expect her to take over the store when they retire. She wants this too, maybe. She is a serious woman prone to bursts of rage. She meet-cutes Wade, a water guy with a heart as big as the ocean, and all the typical rom-com shenanigans follow, just with the aspects of their one-element natures used for both laugh-inducing and lovely effect.
So yes, Elemental manages to divide our would-be lovers by class, culture, temperament, and even basic chemistry. Culture and temperament are the most important factors in their difficult-to-make-work romance, but the others are definitely there too. Sometimes it feels like too much. The plot that runs under the romance has to do with a leak that threatens to flood the part of town where all the fire people live, and it’s the weakest part of the film, but everything else is so magical I didn’t really care. The film is always beautiful to look at. Visually, it is consistently witty. The voice-acting is superb. It reminded me most of the films of Nora Ephron and Jacques Demy. When you’re talking resplendent, modern romances and smart rom-coms, you don’t get any better than that.
Ultimately, I think Elemental’s risk in packing in so many divides between its lovers is a strength. I am not a child of immigrants like director Peter Sohn, on whose upbringing the story is based, so I do not resonate with that part of Ember’s story, though I’m sure many audience members will. I am an emotional cry baby though, and my wife is more on the fiery side, so that dynamic spoke to me. Maybe you and your partner are separated by class or cultural background. If so, I reckon those parts of the story will hit home with you. The best Pixar movies have given us language to talk about things we didn’t know how to talk about before. Elemental is that kind of vocabulary-expanding film.
Elemental isn’t perfect, but it’s a big swing with a big heart, and it connects way more than it misses. And every moment feels genuine, like it’s rooted in someone real life experience, like every storytelling decision was an act of love. It’s magic.
Elijah Davidson is Co-Director of Brehm Film and Senior Film Critic. Subscribe to Come & See, his weekly newsletter that guides you through the greatest films ever made, and find more of his work at elijahdavidson.com.
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