Heartwarming and packed to bursting with visual ingenuity, tearjerking moments, and sharp humour, Elio is one of Pixar’s absolute best. While indebted to the kinds of sci-fi comedy templates and the sentimental hallmarks laid out by previous Pixar efforts, Elio hits a pleasing, thoughtful sweet spot that makes for effortless viewing by audiences of all ages. It also helps to make reaching for the stars (literally and figuratively) look pretty cool, balancing cartoonish silliness and surprisingly deep philosophy and science in interesting ways. (How many family films are willing to talk about physics and give some shoutouts to Carl Sagan?) It’s a great time at the movies, and one I can see people (including myself) returning to again and again.
Eleven year old Elio Solís (voiced by Yonas Kibreab) is having trouble adjusting to his new life. His parents have passed away, and he’s currently living with his Aunt Olga (Zoe Saldaña) on an Air Force base. He’s sad and struggling at first, but once he learns about the wonders of space exploration and the Voyager program’s attempts to contact other forms of life in the solar system, Elio begins a campaign to make contact himself, hoping to get abducted and whisked away a place where he can be taken in by a new extraterrestrial family. At times, Elio can be a bit much, leading to an overwhelmed and unprepared Olga (who was training to be an astronaut before tragedy struck) shipping the kid off to a military boarding school, which doesn’t help matters.
But through a fortuitous series of events, Elio’s dreams come true one dark and stormy night, and he’s beamed up to the space station of the Communiverse, a place where the best and brightest minds from across the galaxy come to bounce ideas off each other. The various aliens on board all believe Elio is the leader of Earth, which is a lie the kid happily goes along with, until the Communiverse is threatened by warmongering, battle armoured worm, Lord Grigon (Brad Garrett), whose application for membership into the group has been denied. Grigon swears revenge and eradication, and in order for Elio to keep his spot in space, he agree to help fight back the invading hordes. Ill equipped to navigate such delicate negotiations and potential war, Elio finds an unlikely ally in Lord Grigon’s chipper, kind hearted son, Glordon (Remy Edgerly).
Directors Domee Shi (Turning Red), Madeline Sharafian, and Adrian Molina (Coco, and the first director to start production on Elio before leaving to work on other projects) and their team of writers strike a nice balance between sadness and wonder early on. Elio’s reasoning for wanting to leave this planet will resonate with anyone who has felt adrift and out of place at a young age, and that yearning to belong is nicely conveyed through Kibreab’s wonderful comedic timing. The same can be said for Elio’s spiritual counterpart, Glordon, who is one of the most endearing and likeable characters in Pixar’s history. Elio is the conflicted and interesting protagonist, but Glordon will steal the audience’s heart.
Elio holds visual delights around every corner, including a clever number of sight gags, most notably any bits involving the Communiverse’s liquid computer (Shirley Henderson) and a hilariously elaborate washroom. It’s a perfect symphony of colours, shapes, and forms that fit the grand sci-fi setting of the story. Similarly, the more muted tones of the film’s earthbound moments are artful in their own way, depicting Earth as a place that’s sometimes dark, but still uniquely vibrant. The character design and set pieces are top notch across the board, reaffirming Pixar as the gold standard for animation these days.
Elio captures the feeling of an Amblin Entertainment project from the early 1980s, with boundless wonder, resounding sentiment, and just enough danger to keep things interesting, all set here to an outstanding score from Rob Simonsen that swings like it was made for a live action spectacle. The plot feels at times like a mash-up of Pixar’s Up and the cult comedy classic Galaxy Quest (albeit from a young person’s perspective), but even when it feels like Elio is going to run out of steam, the creators come up with novel twists that keep things going. It’s a movie that will give those in the right frame of mind the warmest and fuzziest of feelings. I can’t wait to watch it again. (And maybe get a Glordon plush. I’m not made of stone.)
Elio opens in theatres everywhere on Friday, June 20, 2025.
