Disney Pixar’s Soul Will Move Yours This Christmas as the Mouse and the Desk Lamp Have the Magical Touch.
Disney Pixar’s Soul is yet another achievement in animation for the Mouse and Desk Lamp tag team combination. This go around the magic is revealed as Joe Gardner (Jamie Foxx), a middle-school band teacher gets the chance of a lifetime to play at the best jazz club in town. Unfortunately, one small misstep takes him from the streets of New York City to The Great Before – a fantastical place where new souls get their personalities, quirks and interests before they go to Earth.
“Donning this role and-and-and it being such a-a-a momentous, uh, role and at the same time having the music, is it something that I’m, you know, that’s what I came out here to do. Uh, and so, I know my grandmother, who is looking down, would be proud, uh, that we are doing something like this,” said Foxx about his take on Joe.
Soul definitely rides of the line of secularism the Presbyterian theology of predestination, but does it beautifully without offending the atheist and theist sensibilities. At times of I thought of this as an animated version of 1941’s Here Comes Mr. Jordan of 1978’s Heaven Can Wait, but instead of a romantic comedy or a slant on getting back to Heaven, it is the coming of a new life into the world. Enter Tina Fey as 22, the reluctant soul that is avoiding being born and thanks to the Counselor Jerrys, convince Joe to mentor 22 into becoming human.
“I think my parents were huge mentors, obviously. But it’s one we overlook a lot of times. My parents, um, encouraged me to pursue the arts. They didn’t-they didn’t ask me to have something to fall back on. Um, and then, a lot of teachers that I had. You know, I had writing teachers in-in regular, public school in Pennsylvania, who encouraged me,” said Fey during the Soul press conference.
One thing that was unique about Soul is that this was more for the parents than the children. The themes of hope, regret, spirituality, growth and redemption all play into the ideals of the adulthood and coming to terms with who we are, what we want as we mature and change. Unlike most Disney-Pixar films, this one reminds the audience that sometimes you don’t have to shoot for the stars when all you really needed was already at home. A very New York story as mantra goes, “You can make it there, you can make it anywhere.”
Soul begins streaming on Disney+ Christmas Day.
-
Overall Score
Summary
Soul will not only warm your heart but remind you that sometimes the thing you are looking for was inside of you all along.
