Jeanine’s Review: Disney and Pixar “Elio”

Opening in theaters Friday, June 20th, Disney and Pixar Studio’s newest film Elio, takes audiences from the vastness of Space to the depths of the human heart.

In Elio, we follow the shenanigans of Elio Solis, an eleven-year-old who has responded to the loss of his parents with an obsessive quest to get abducted by aliens.  Ditching school and evading his long-suffering aunt, he constantly heads off armed with a ham radio and collander helmet to try to attract the attention of aliens and escape the planet that has left him alone and adrift.

Of course, as luck would have it, aliens do show up looking for Earth’s leader, and as the only person willing to take the situation at face value, Elio manages to talk his way into getting beamed up to Communiverse–a sort of perpetual mixer for the brightest minds of the galaxy, each an ambassador for their home planets.  As soon as it appears that all of Elio’s dreams have come true with his acceptance into the Communiverse society, a wrench is thrown into the proceedings by the arrival of the emotionally volatile and pugilistic Lord Grigon of Hylurg who also desperately wants in, but who is a less-attractive candidate to the more passive and mildly effete members.  His violent outrage at being rejected sends the other ambassadors into a tizzy and Elio finds himself tasked with resolving Grigon’s issues if he wants to complete his membership process.  Failure means a return to Earth while the Communiverse makes tracks to anyplace Grigon-free.

To accomplish his mission, Elio will make friends, reconcile with his aunt, and perhaps finally regain the sense of connection he lost with his parents.

As a work of art, Elio looks as good as you would expect from Pixar, with the colorful and utopian Communiverse resembling life inside a kaleidoscope.  It demonstrates a sharp contrast from Elio’s Earth life environment on a military base, surrounded by Brutalist architecture and drab fatigues.

All the different ambassadors are marvels of inventive character design as well, in every shape and form.  How do they all survive in one area when they clearly derive from wildly different natural environments and must have a variety of different biological demands?  We will chalk that up to the amazing technical advances apparent in the Communiverse, along with the endless AYCE burgers.

In contrast, the humans in the film seem somewhat uninspired.  Elio himself has a familiar look to him, and might not be out of place attending school with Mei Lee in director Domee Shi’s other film, Turning Red.  Olga Solis, Elio’s aunt, has the same exasperated-yet-loving moments that Nani had in Lilo and Stitch.  In particular, she seems to have some plot threads dropped as there are continued mentions of the professional sacrifices she’s made for Elio throughout the film, and yet nothing ever comes of that.  We are just supposed to imagine that the opportunity to live as a family and perpetually fish Elio out of trouble makes up for not fulfilling her potential of being an astronaut, as perhaps Buzz taught us in Lightyear.

The scene-stealer however, is Remy Edgerly’s Glorden, an adorable alien whose curiosity and openheartedness are as appealing for poor, friendless Elio as they are disappointing for his militaristic father.  The bond between the two of them, strengthened in a montage of them enjoying the perks of the Communiverse and sucking down the signature drink “Glorp” until they become unwell, helps bring Elio out of his state of isolation and teaches him to think of others, beyond himself.

Elio is, as are most of Pixar’s stories, a grand adventure which serves as a backdrop for very personal character development.  It’s cute and funny and an enjoyable watch.  If there is a story flaw it is that there are so many story elements, it is inevitable that some of them get short shrift.  With similar story beats to films as dissimilar as Lilo and Stitch to Strange World to Galaxy Quest to Mandalorian, with a few vaguely intense horror moments thrown in, there is a lot going on.  What it does nicely, however, with its clear adoration of space and occasional Carl Sagan voice overs, is to evoke the 1960s golden age of space travel when the world was, for a time, able to look past itself to the skies and wonder what’s out there and are we alone?  Questions Elio answers for himself and ones to which someday, hopefully, Earth may return.

 

Elio:  
Voice Cast: Yonas Kibreab (Elio), Zoe Saldaña (Aunt Olga), Remy Edgerly (Glordon), Brad Garrett (Lord Grigon), Jameela Jamil (Ambassador Questa), Shirley
Henderson (Ooooo).
Directors: Madeline Sharafian, Domee Shi, Adrian Molina
Producer: Mary Alice Drumm
Rating:  PG for some action/peril and thematic elements.
Release Date: June 20, 2025

*Don’t forget to stay for the (short) post-credit scene.