Elemental director Peter Sohn reveals real-life inspiration for the Pixar movie. Starring voice actors Leah Lewis and Mamoudou Athie as Ember and Wade, Elemental will introduce viewers to a new world - a bustling city in which personified versions of the elements (water, air, fire, and land) live together. The two protagonists Ember and Wade are fire and water-based characters, respectively, who find that they have more in common than they expected based on their opposing backgrounds. Director Sohn has worked as an animator on many Pixar films over the past two decades, and previously directed The Good Dinosaur.
While speaking with the inspiration for Elemental came from his real-life family and marriage. The director has previously spoken about the film's family drama and relationships taking center stage in the animated movie, and has now opened up about his own family's Korean immigrant roots informing some elements of the film. In addition, Sohn revealed that his marriage served as a basis for the romance in the film due to the director marrying someone outside his ethnicity and dealing with the subsequent "culture clash." See what Sohn had to say below:
“Maybe it’s because when I was a kid, I really didn’t appreciate or understand what it meant to be an immigrant, to come to the U.S., and all the hard work that they did to give my brother and me our lives. That was one big nugget that was just sitting with me. On the other side, I married someone that wasn’t Korean, and there was a lot of culture clash with that in my world. And that brought to me to this idea of finding opposites. And the question of what if fire fell in love with water came. As an animator, what could be a fun world to play with… so the fire and water is one thing. But then tying that to culture clash, was part of that metaphor. And then in that world, all of a sudden this idea of sacrifice, and understanding what our parents had given started to make the soup of what this film is.”
Elemental Could Be A Unique Pixar Movie Experience
Elemental has already drawn comparisons to several previous Pixar projects, particularly Inside Out and Soul due to its character designs and personification of inanimate concepts. In addition, some have compared the film to WALL-E due to a love story forming the basis of the plot. Elemental has also garnered some Avatar: The Last Airbender comparisons due to its use of the four elements as a story device.
Despite the many comparisons Elemental has garnered to other animated works, the Pixar film has the potential to completely set itself apart from Pixar's other projects. Though WALL-E does have a love story at its center, and many other Pixar movies including Toy Story 4, Coco, Ratatouille Cars, and Up have romantic themes and plot lines, Elemental will make the romantic storyline its focus and hone in on the characters' relationships with one another as the main narrative. In addition, Elemental seems to be following the lead of recent Pixar projects by presenting larger philosophical and societal questions through the lens of a unique character's perspective.
The trailers for Elemental have already revealed the creative potential inherent in a city inhabited by several different elements, which speaks to Sohn's experiences growing up in a diverse part of New York. With its vibrant visuals and bustling city environment populated by non-human entities, Elemental will be introducing a new and fascinating world to Pixar fans. By bringing his life experiences into the animated movie, Sohn is able to differentiate Elemental from many other works and use the nonhuman elements to tell a very human story through the connection between Ember and Wade.
Source: Variety
