Pixar's coming-of-age adventure follows two boys and their newfound friendship during one summer in a beautiful seaside town on the Italian Riviera. They're also sea monsters, disguised as humans among the villagers who hunt and fear their kind. The feature debut from Enrico Casarosa, writer-director of Oscar-nominated Pixar short La Luna, who had this to say about Luca: "This is a deeply personal story for me, not only because it’s set on the Italian Riviera where I grew up, but because at the core of this film is a celebration of friendship."
From the glistening stone-cobble walkways to the colourful towering architecture, from the bucket-loads of Italian culture seeping through the streets to the gorgeous riviera that made you wish our oceans were really that clean, Pixar has gone all in to make this one of their most memorable and live-in settings to date.
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A sweet, charming film about first love couched in an underdog/outsider narrative.
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Luca will perhaps be more memorable for what it might have been than for what it actually is.
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(Luca) offers the studio's hallmark visual splendour, yet fails to venture outside of safe waters.
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The layered dynamics and pure, honest emotions underneath Luca‘s simple coming-of-age story are what elevate the film to one of Pixar’s best...
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Ultimately, the luminous atmosphere of the film’s setting is more resonant than any particular thing that transpires there.
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One of the most grounded and enjoyable coming-of-age stories the studio has ever told.
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A gorgeous parable about a delicately unfolding relationship, set in ravishing Italian landscape, between two young and idealistic sea monsters: it’s The Shape of Water meets Call Me by Your Name.
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The pleasure of Luca lies less in its intellectual takeaways, than in the profound sensations that it stirs up. It’s a beautiful evocation of youthful possibility...
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The movie as a whole is oddly sleepy, rolling along pleasantly rather than blazing a trail.
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It’s not canonical Pixar, but it’s as sweet and satisfying as artisanal gelato on a summer afternoon.
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While (Enrico Casarosa's) images have a perky bravura... the script, by Jesse Andrews and Mike Jones, is pretty thin stuff.
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Luca doesn't drown in the usual Pixar profundity yet still navigates coming-of-age themes quite swimmingly...
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A sunny, nimble little story that... threatens to blow away in the sea breeze, as charming as it is minor.
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Maybe not every Pixar movie can be Up. For now, we’ll just let adorable be enough.
Full reviewLuca (2021) is available to stream in New Zealand now on Google Play and Apple TV and Disney+.
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