While Disney has been churning out stale, emotionally-lacking remakes of their nineties golden-era films in live action or hyperreal CGI form, film lovers have still been holding quiet hope for their subsidiary company, Pixar, to deliver the fun, nostalgic, and weepy animation we deserve. Enter Soul, an upcoming animation film starring Jamie Foxx and Tina Fey, which has just released its first teaser trailer and poster.
Set in a modern day, richly detailed and diverse New York City, the trailer introduces us to Joe, a music school teacher with a passion for jazz. Soon, though, he becomes trapped in a Stranger Things-esque underworld, where his soul is separated from his body and transported to a center in which souls develop and gain passions before being transported to a newborn child. Joining Jamie Foxx – in the first Pixar film featuring a Black lead – will be Tina Fey, Questlove, Phylicia Rashad and Daveed Diggs.
The film is helmed by Pete Docter, whose previous directorial ventures – Monsters, Inc., Up, Inside Out – are some of the most beloved in the Pixar canon, giving Soul some serious hype. With music composed by the duo responsible for the Academy Award-winning score for The Social Network, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, hopes are high for this animation to have as great a score as Pixar’s previous films, with 2009’s Up also scooping the Oscar for Best Score.
Soul is set to be released in the UK on 19 June, 2020.
Words by Steph Green