| Animation, Comedy, Fantasy |
Director: Enrico Casarosa
Writers: Jesse Andrews
Mike Jones
Cast: Jacob Tremblay, Jack Dylan Grazer, Emma Berman, Marco Barricelli
Release date: 13th June 2021
SYNOPSIS:
Pixar’s “Luca,” an Italian-set animated fairy tale concerning two young sea monsters exploring an unknown human world, offers the studio’s hallmark visual splendor, yet fails to venture outside of safe waters.
MOVIE REVIEW:
Looming against his desires are his mother (Maya Rudolph) and father’s (Jim Gaffigan) fear from living by a human, sea-monster-hunting oceanfront village. Nevertheless, dry world affectations fall to the ocean floor: an alarm clock, a playing card, and a wrench. These items draw Luca closer to the surface. As does Alberto, an older, confident amphibian boy who now lives alone in a crumbling castle tower by the beach, and claims his father is temporarily traveling.
The premise of the film also literally disguises Luca and Alberto as humans amongst the fish hunting Portorosso community. But in a deeper sense, many secrets lurk within Alberto, from the whereabouts of his dad to his general knowledge. He portrays himself to Luca as a world-weary traveler, the kind of friend who swears they’ve been to a place a million times, but has only walked past it.
He also tells the impressionable Luca how the stars are actually fish swimming in a vast black ocean, that school is unnecessary, and to ignore his “Bruno” (or the tiny scared voice inside your head). His outsized confidence papers over his clear insecurities, especially as Luca first grows closer to Giulia and later thinks for himself.
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