Disney’s new Pixar movie, Soul, was just released on Disney+ recently. The movie stars Jamie Foxx as it focuses on Joe Gardener, a middle school band teacher who believes that his purpose in life is to be successful in music. His whole life changes when he gets the gig of his life but then he dies. Instead of accepting his fate and going to the “The Great Beyond,” he escapes and meets a new soul named 22, who is voiced by Tina Fey, who has no spark nor purpose for life. Joe works with 22, to get back into his real body as Joe is a Soul That is the synopsis for the movie. Soul is a well-crafted movie as it has great material for kids to watch, wonderful details in animation and as stated before, a meaningful message.
The film is very successful in providing a meaningful theme to the movie while simultaneously giving children something to look at. That is the type of movie I appreciate. A children’s movie that can provide children meaningful themes and wonderful visuals. It is not just some kid´s movie with a low-quality animation and ´potty´ humor. It is something the kids of tomorrow could watch and the people of the present could enjoy. As a matter of fact, I watched it with both my 6-year old brother and my father. My father had actually enjoyed more of the jokes than my brother. It is a great movie for all ages.
From an artistic standpoint, the detail in the animation. Although, I do have to say that with a Disney budget, the animation has to be better. It is something to look at how far animation has come in with Pixar. An example would be that in Toy Story, the kids shown are just simply cut and paste versions of Andy. But in Soul, there is a scene where Joe goes to his local barber and we see how all the characters in the room have their own design. No matter how small the character is, they have their own personality animated and I think that it is a wonderful aspect of the movie. Not only the character designs are wonderful but also the lighting in certain scenes adds to the movie and how it also adds meaning to some scenes.
Soul has themes about life, what sparks our life, and what could happen if we fall down that rabbit hole of incessant worrying about our life goals. Joe strongly believed that his life’s purpose was to be successful in music, as the music was his life. But the audience is shown otherwise and is taught that our spark in life and purpose is not necessarily our personal goals but to add ourselves to lives and others.
Overall, Soul is a wonderful movie to watch with kids and adults. It could even give some people a bit of help to those who need to look at their life.
I had just had to add this in but my favorite scene/still is when we get to see the full picture of the ¨The Great Beyond¨. I like how it seemed awe-inspiring yet a bit scary to look at.
I highly recommend watching this movie. I would rate Soul a 4.5/5 Bucky the Blazers.
Anthony Perez is a First-Timer Senior in the AT Torch Staff. He chose to take part in the Torch to improve as a writer and to get out of his comfort zone. He decided that was the best choice as he loves the work because he views it as challenging yet fun.