Movie Review: Luca

For quite some time now, films released by Pixar Animation Studios have held a certain level of gravitas and audiences have come to expect something special with almost every release. The latest offering from studio, Luca, while not on the level of its best films (Inside Out [2015], Toy Story [1995], or WALL-E [2008] for example), is a charming and often endearing tale of a young person finding his place in the world while, at the same time, striving to make it better for others around him as well. In short, it’s a story and lesson that couldn’t come at a better time.

Set in a seaside town on the Italian Riviera, this coming-of-age story about a young boy named Luca (voice of Jacob Tremblay) and his adventures with a newfound best friend, Alberto (voice of Jack Dylan Grazer) as they explore the world above the water for the first time. Both Luca and Alberto are, after all, sea monsters posing as humans trying to experience the magic of the surface world (including pasta, scooters, gelato). Somewhere along the way they meet and befriend a red-headed spitfire of energy named Giulia (voice of Emma Berman). Together, they decide to enter the town’s annual bike race (they boys intend to use the winnings to buy a Vespa while Giulia is intent on proving her worth in a town she only visits in the summer.

Of course, this behavior alerts Luca’s parents who believe he has been going out every day and tending to the family’s school of fish instead of visiting the human world. Once they trek into town to locate their missing son, only to find themselves in the midst of the big bike race, the two worlds collide in a, well, fish-out-of-water story that is at once a bit predictable yet oddly entertaining in its earnestness.

Jacob Tremblay in “Luca.”

As directed by Enrico Casarosa, making his feature-film debut here, the film moves briskly along as a solid tale of two “brothers” striking out to craft something comparable to their own way in the world. Working from a screenplay by Jesse Andrews (Me and Earl and the Dying Girl [2015]) and Mike Jones (Soul [2021]) that some may find meandering in parts, Casarosa manages to tell a reasonably entertaining story about these pseudo-brothers and the family they come to represent to each other. That aspect of family is probably the greatest triumph of Luca as it manages to lift the emotional resonance of the film simply by playing itself out.

While not ascending to the heights of Pixar’s greatest triumphs, the studios latest endeavor, the coming-of-age fish-out-of-water tale, Luca, is a solid, entertaining, and often rewarding family film.

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Mike Tyrkus

Editor in Chief at CinemaNerdz.com

An independent filmmaker, co-writer and director of over a dozen short films, the Editor in Chief of CinemaNerdz.com has spent much of the last three decades as a writer and editor specializing in biographical and critical reference sources in literature and the cinema, beginning in February 1991 reviewing films for his college newspaper. He was a member of the Detroit Film Critics Society, as well as the group's webmaster and one-time President for over a decade until the group ceased to exist. His contributions to film criticism can be found in Magill's Cinema Annual, VideoHound's Golden Movie Retriever (of which he was the editor for nearly a decade until it too ceased to exist), the International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers, and the St. James Film Directors Encyclopedia (on which he collaborated with editor Andrew Sarris). He has also appeared on the television program Critic LEE Speaking alongside Lee Thomas of FOX2 and Adam Graham, of The Detroit News. He currently lives in the Detroit area with his wife and their dogs.

@miketyrkus

Mike Tyrkus

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