One of Pixar’s smaller, sweeter efforts, Luca traces a friendship that develops between two young sea creatures (merboys?) who venture onto land together, where they transform into humans and immerse themselves in the rhythms of a coastal Italian village. The early scenes of Luca (earnestly voiced by Jacob Tremblay) and the slightly older Alberto (Jack Dylan Grazer) falling into friendship are the best in the movie, as they knowingly capture the enthusiastic abandon with which kids bond (in this case, while building a wonky “Vespa” out of spare parts and jumping it off a ramp into the sea). In the town of Portorosso, the boys encounter gruff fishermen devoted to hunting “sea monsters” like them, but also a spirited, welcoming girl (Emma Berman) who summers there with her divorced father. With its haphazard Italian dialogue and occasional reliance on caricature, Luca doesn’t appear to have undergone the same cultural sensitivity training as, say, Moana, but I’ll leave it to the Italians to be offended. Director Enrico Casarosa is working from a script by Jesse Andrews and Mike Jones, and while there are allusions to Japan’s Hayao Miyazaki in plot (Ponyo) and place (Porco Rosso), Casarosa and his team of animators manage a visual aesthetic that is all their own—including simple character designs that are reminiscent of classic, wooden Pinocchio puppets. As the story proceeds, Luca and Alberto’s rainbow scales—which unveil with a shimmer whenever the boys get wet—also accrue metaphorical potency, leading to a revelatory climax that could easily be read as a comforting coming-out party.
