With the not so great John Lasseter coming under fire in recent years for horrible behavior, Pixar needed a better figure to represent what makes the studio special. Enter Pete Docter, the guy who came up with Monsters, Inc, Up, AND Inside Out. The man has a wealth of creativity inside that large head of his. Soul is his most recent creative explosion, animating that part of ourselves that’s been to this point intangible, like our minds/feelings in Inside Out. I look forward to Docter’s next film, probably about the afterlife, or memory, or something like that.
Joe Gardner (Jamie Foxx) is still waiting for his big break. Joe wants to be a jazz musician, but has settled for a life teaching high school music part time until that break comes. On the day he’s offered a full time teaching gig, he also gets a shot to perform with Dorothea Williams (Angela Bassett), a legendary jazz singer in New York. Conflicted but very excited, Joe doesn’t notice a sewer grate is open and he falls in, sending his soul potentially to the great beyond. Determined to make that show, Joe refuses to go, instead taking a job mentoring 22 (Tina Fey) a soul that hasn’t found her spark to go to Earth yet.
Like Inside Out, the key to Soul’s success is how simple but believable the world building in the movie is. Docter takes all the concepts about what a soul is and distills it into something simple and easily understandable to kids and adults alike. A world of unformed souls figuring out what they are going to be. Awesome & easy! There’s some arbitrary parts of a person’s being (if you’re self-absorbed, empathetic, etc). But the key ingredient that makes a soul ready for Earth is that “spark:” the thing that gives them a will to live. So there’s a place in the world of unformed souls called the hall of everything that lets you figure out what your spark is going to be. Great, and also totally logical! Souls on Earth can also reconnect with the soul world by getting in their zone, like when a musician like Joe closes his eyes and starts playing piano as an example. Makes total sense! And for the bad part, there’s a lost souls area; tough, but understandable too! Docter’s greatest gift as a storyteller is taking these complex ideas or places and widdling them down into worlds that all ages can understand.
So once Docter nails the world down, he then puts a story in place that works in that Pixar way of amusing kids while emotionally wrecking adults. The arrested developed high school music teacher was a perfect choice pairing with a confused soul. Of course 22 doesn’t understand Copernicus, or Mother Theresa (adults will love those jokes): they’re fully formed souls who probably found their sparks early and often. Joe is more like the everyman: he thinks his spark is one thing, and as time goes on, the likelihood of that one spark happening again fades slowly away. 22 gets that, as they are tormented by never having a spark and being ok with it. Ergo, both need each other to open their perspectives and understand how to become a soul that loves life, but are worried that their insecurity and guilt might transform them into lost souls. The perfect Pixar storytelling section is when 22 goes searching for Earthly sparks: seeing that joy of experience for both Joe and 22 is simultaneously funny, poignant, and emotionally rich and will draw laughter and tears in equal measure.
Soul cements 2020 as the year of the Docter. One set cures people of physical ailments. Pixar’s version cures us of our emotional ones. I hope you all find that spark that makes your life worth living, even in these dark times. And hopefully, 22’s fate means the fate of the New York Knicks fans will increase again. I look forward to angry Knicks fans messaging Tina Fey blaming her for their troubles, one of the best jokes in the movie.