Pixar’s latest, “Onward,” goes even further.
“Long ago, the world was full of wonder,”
a narrator introduces. There were magical
creatures like trolls, gnomes, elves and dragons
with special powers. But the drumbeat of
progress, from light bulbs to airplanes to smart
phones, has steadily sapped all the fantasy
from life. In New Mushroomton, a Los Angeles-
like sprawl of suburbs and freeways, those
once magical creatures live an orderly and
predicable life much like our own, just with
unicorns always getting in the trash and pixies
that ride in biker gangs.
The set-up is quintessentially Pixar, even if
“Onward” — with its blueish, pointed-eared
elves in flannel shirts and ’70s-style anthems —
nearly resembles Pixar’s answer to prog rock.
This is one of the studio’s odder looking films,
one that owes much more to Dungeons &
Dragons and the rock-geek exuberance of Jack
Black than your typical animated feature.
“Onward,” written and directed by Dan Scanlon
(“Monsters University”), may initially be a tough
sell, and it’s not a movie likely to immediately
rise to the top of everyone’s Pixar’s rankings.
(“Ratatouille” forever.) But its eccentric odyssey
of two brothers delving into a fantastical past to
find their way through grief and self-doubt is a
worthy addition to the studio’s canon. Its world
is a little incongruous (one wants to unsee the
centaur police officer), and the movie’s depiction
of death isn’t so well honed as it is in, say, “Up” or
“Toy Story 3.” But “Onward” makes the most of its
strange assemblage to tell a sweet and moving
story — enough so to leave you yet again
shaking your head at Pixar’s magic act.