Soul: Jazz and Life's Beauty

 

Soul is the latest addition to Pixar's animated film line up and I must say, it's truly an interesting watch that needs digestion. 

 Soul like any other Pixar animated film builds upon already existing conceptual ideas and adds a relatable human feel to it. I do not want to be that guy but I feel like this is the second really conceptual focused film I've seen this year with Tenet being the first and while both have very great ideas, I think this film definitely fully realized it's ideas rather than overdoing and falling flat. Now, back to this film. 

 Soul tells the story of a sad middle aged pianist named Joe Gardner (played excellently by the talented Jamie Foxx) who aspires to play in jazz clubs and make music for the rest of his life as it is his "purpose" in life. Joe struggles with trying to make a big break as a musician as well as trying to inspire teaching students of a school as a part time music teacher. That sounds rather simple but something happens at a crucial moment in his life where he has a near death experience and appears in transit between life and death. 

This doesn't sound like a new concept yes, but Pixar definitely brought a spin into it as Joe finds away to escape from being sent to the other side by instead going to section where unborn babies souls are prepared for their birth on Earth. There, Joe stumbles unto godlike beings who go by "Jerry"(and one Terry) and they link him up with a pessimistic child soul called "22" who doesn't want to go to earth, they find out they share a mutualistic goal which sets them on a life changing journey of self discovery. 

 I love how this film tried extremely hard in depicting the little things that make us the humans we are. Every character with a speaking role feels like a regular relatable human being and it also handles black characters extremely well because there are a couple of great moments with one being in a barber shop. The jokes land, the writing is done really well and feels natural, the story is touching and doesn't feel  convoluted or boring in any way. The cast is great and I found myself caring for all these characters to some degree with my favorites being the two main ones, Joe and 22. 

I think Soul displays an exciting future for Pixar films and I'm really excited to see what they do next because this entry to their filmography was quite refreshing and enjoyable. Also, I know there's a lot of complaining of POC Disney characters not fully appearing as themselves in films and while I think that happens here, I think it works for the story and there's a significant amount of screen time for Regular Joe here to enjoy and appreciate. 

I'm not really into giving films scores but I'll try that today and give this film an 8/10, I think it has great replay value and could be another Pixar classic along greats like Toy Story, Wall E and Up!

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