Pixar’s ‘Elemental’ Charms Cannes, Closes 2023 Festival With Five-Minute Standing Ovation

's title character and EVE,'s Woody and Bo Peep, or (get your tissues ready)'s Carl and Ellie. But not until has a Pixar movie focused so directly on a love story between the central couple, drawing inspiration from beloved rom-coms of the past to shape the chemistry between its main characters: Ember Lumen (Leah Lewis), a young, headstrong fire element, and Wade Ripple (Mamoudou Athie), a fun and sensitive water element.Lewis and Athie joined ET's Matt Cohen at Pixar Animation Studios in San Francisco recently to discuss more about their characters and the upcoming film, which has been seven years in the making for director Peter Sohn, who previously directed  for Pixar. takes place in Element City, in a universe where different elements — fire, water, earth and air — traditionally keep to themselves, sometimes facing xenophobic attitudes as they strive to live alongside one another.

Jazz Tangcay Artisans Editor Pete Docter, Pixar’s creative chief officer, is hoping the animation studio’s 27th release, “Elemental,” will draw families to movie theaters this weekend. Peter Sohn‘s film is a story about immigration, families, duty and love. Not only does Docter say the visuals are “a spectacle,” but believes it should be experienced with an audience. Docter, who has been with the studio since the beginning and was upped to CCO in 2018, has come under criticism recently that Pixar has lost its magic touch. Here, Docter sits down with Variety over Zoom to discuss Pixar’s approach to programming, Cannes, “Elemental,” and what’s next for the studio.

Less than a month after giving her uncensored opinions about Robert Redford in Cannes, Jane Fonda was at the Tribeca Festival on Saturday speaking her mind about the climate crisis, Joe Biden, and her father Henry Fonda.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent The Cannes Film Festival has unveiled the dates of its 77th edition which will take place May 14-25, 2024. This year’s festival wrapped May 27 with Justine Triet’s “Anatomy of a Fall” winning the Palme d’Or, Jonathan Glazer’s “A Zone of Interest” take home the Grand Prize, and Aki Kaurismäki’s “Fallen Leaves” nabbing the Jury Prize. The jury of the 76th edition was presided over by Ruben Ostlund, the two-time Palme d’Or winning director of “The Square” and “Triangle of Sadness.” The first post-pandemic edition, 2023 was marked by an overall well-received Official Selection lineup and a strong presence of American talent and studios. Some of the anticipated films spotlighted at the festival included Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon”, Todd Haynes’ “May December” and Wes Anderson‘s “Asteroid City,” as well as Disney’s “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny,” Pedro Almodóvar’s short film “Strange Way of Life” and Pixar’s “Elemental.”

Netflix, Prime Video, Max, Paramount+, Hulu, Peacock and Disney+ throughout the month of June, so not only is there a little something for everyone, there’s enough to get you through those days when it’s just to hot to step outside.Check out our list of some of the best new movies to stream in June 2023 below.June 1 – MaxAs we near Quentin Tarantino’s tenth and final film (“The Movie Critic”), the debate will once again rage over which of QT’s movies is the very best. And a strong case could be made for “Jackie Brown.” For his much-anticipated follow-up to the zeitgeist-capturing (and Oscar-winning) “Pulp Fiction,” Tarantino chose an adaptation of Elmore Leonard’s 1992 novel “Rum Punch.” (It was his first and only movie based on a preexisting source.) Tarantino went to casting some of his heroes in the lead roles – Pam Grier, who made a name for herself starring in low-budget exploitation films for Roger Corman, plays the title role; and Robert Forster, who appeared in cult favorites like “Alligator” and Disney’s misbegotten “The Black Hole.” It’s a twisty crime movie, for sure, with outstanding performers in supporting parts (Bridget Fonda, Robert De Niro, Michael Keaton and Samuel L.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Aside from its Palme d’Or for Justine Triet’s “Anatomy of a Fall,” the French cinema world is also celebrating the near-complete recovery of French box office after the pandemic. Ticket sales are still 11.6 % down on the average levels of 2017 to 2019, but the good news is that the B.O. jumped by 33% with 82.38 million admissions during the first five months of 2023, according to the CNC (National Film Board). The upward trend is driven by the spike in anticipated U.S. movies being released — they skyrocketed from 29 in 2022 to 51 in 2023 during the first five months, according to Comscore France. There’s also been a tide of successful French movies, ranging from big-budget, franchise-based movies like Guillaume Canet’s “Asterix and Obelix: The Middle Kingdom,” Philippe Lacheau’s “Alibi.com 2” and Martin Bourboulon’s “The Three Musketeers: D’Artagnan,” to original fare like the Omar Sy starrer “Father and Soldier” and François Ozon’s 1950’s-set courtroom comedy “The Crime is Mine.” Maiwenn’s “Jeanne du Barry” starring Johnny Depp ranks as May’s fifth biggest hit with more than 550,000 admissions ($4.3 million) since its world premiere on opening night of the Cannes Film Festival.

Quentin Tarantino is no stranger to violence on screen. This is a filmmaker who loves to be pretty shocking when it comes to the gore associated with death, and it’s a staple of his work dating back to his first feature, “Reservoir Dogs.” And apparently, his depiction of violence on screen was enough to force Cannes to introduce a new warning label for some films.

Jane Fonda took matters into her own hands over the weekend at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival. The 85-year-old veteran actress introduced the Palme d'Or Award to French director Justine Triet.Fonda introduced the historic moment, noting that seven female directors were nominated for the prestigious award for the first time and applauding the festival for its progress.She then gave Triet the award for her film.

Jane Fonda found a way to get director Justine Triet’s attention after she left the stage without her award at the Cannes Film Festival over the weekend.

Jane Fonda took a pretty dramatic step to make sure that director Justine Triet didn’t forget her Palm d’Or award at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival.

A brand new clip for Disney Pixar’s upcoming animation/comedy “Elemental” was unveiled by its stars at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival during a photocall on Friday.

Peter Debruge Chief Film Critic I reckon there are more ideas per second of screentime in “Elemental” than any other Pixar movie to date. So why does this imagination-teasing opposites-attract rom-com feel like a misfire? No one can accuse director Peter Sohn (“The Good Dinosaur”) or his team of under-thinking the ultra-creative studio’s latest high-concept feature, which takes the four elements as identified by various ancient cultures — Fire, Water, Earth and Air — and reimagines them as uneasy neighbors in a crowded modern metropolis. But fun as it can be to soak in the movie’s cheeky sense of detail (from flame-retardant costumes to blink-and-you-miss-them background puns), the whole scenario seems forced: so much world-building to tell a story better suited to flesh-and-blood human characters.

As a feat of pure visual craftsmanship, “Elemental” is anything but simple, often delighting the eyes with inventive character designs and trailblazing animation techniques. For that alone, the Pixar-produced, Peter Sohn-directed feature makes a fitting cap for this year’s Cannes Film Festival, closing the prestigious event with an incident rich and formally vibrant showcase for studio animation might.Though as return to form for Pixar itself – a rekindling of that fire that set hearts ablaze by wedding prodigious technique to (ahem) elementally simple metaphor – the film falls somewhat short of previous highs.

What has fallen flat at Pixar? This is the innovative animation studio that pushed all before it in the first decade of this millennium, that invented a way of turning the plastic finish of digital animation to its advantage in the towering Toy Story, that was prepared to start a film with a 20-minute scene with no dialogue in Wall-E – and revealed that kids didn’t care – and that would make an adventure film with a hero aged 78 years young in UP!. Kids didn’t care about that either, as it turned out, because Carl Fredricksen was a grumpy-gramps adventurer who also didn’t care what others thought of him. Pixar always had something new up its collective artistic sleeve. And yet here they are, coming out with a film as dull-witted and syrupy as Elemental. 

At least once, I can say the winners of the 2023 Cannes Film Festival competition are actually the right ones. Maybe not exactly in the order I would have put them, but still, out of the 21 movies competing, it is hard to argue about almost all of the choices made by the Ruben Ostlund-led jury that, among others, included Americans Brie Larson and Paul Dano. I said almost.

The stars are stepping out for the premiere of Disney & Pixar’s new movie!

CANNES – The 2023 Cannes Film Festival has come to an end and that means the Palme d’Or winner has finally been revealed. Presented by jury president Ruben Östlund and special guest Jane Fonda, the honor went to Justine Triet’s “Anatomy of a Fall.” Recently acquired by NEON, it becomes the independent distributors third Palme winner over the past four years after “Titane” and Best Picture winner, “Parasite.” READ MORE: “The Zone of Interest” Review: Jonathan Glazer’s often brilliant examination of human complicity [Cannes] Tried becomes just the second woman in the 76-year history of the festival to win the Palme after “The Piano’s” Jane Campion and “Titane’s” Julia Ducournau.

It’s a wrap for the 2023 edition of the Cannes Film Festival, where French director Justine Triet’s courtroom thriller “Anatomy of a Fall” has won this year’s Palme d’Or for best film.

The 76th Cannes Film Festival is wrapping up this evening with the main awards, including the Palme d’Or, to be handed out by Ruben Ostlund’s jury inside the Palais. Scroll down for the list of winners which is being updated as prizes are announced.

sting.Jane Fonda revealed Friday she “was in love with” Robert Redford, her on-screen partner for four films — but the “Ordinary People” director, 86, “did not like to kiss” and “has an issue with women.”“He’s always in a bad mood, and I always thought it was my fault,” said Fonda, 85, but added that “he’s a very good person.”The two-time Oscar winner dropped tidbits about her famous male co-stars during an interview at the Cannes Film Festival. Fonda and Redford co-starred in “The Chase” (1966), “Barefoot in the Park” (1967), “The Electric Horseman” (1979) and “Our Souls at Night” (2017).“The last movie I made with him was six years ago,” Fonda said, referring to the Netflix film “Our Souls at Night.”“What was I, about 80 years old or something like that? And I finally knew I had grown up.