#I was sooooo against watching this one bc all the promo was Sharp Fire Lady and Soft Water Boy haha elements!!! cliches!!! bad jokes!!!

[threeawfulfruits]

Btw yall I finally took the jump and watched Elemental last night because it had despite all odds been praised pretty consistently post-release by people whose opinions I respect - and everyone was RIGHT!!!

Despite the poor marketing and the absolutely uninspired, cliche, cringy trailer, this film was freaking PRECIOUS and IMPORTANT. In the first five minutes it made more strides talking about the immigrant experience and the connected cultural prejudice than entire documentaries. The importance of representation has never been more clear in a kid-friendly film - when no one solves the issues plaguing a community because no one FROM that community exists in a place of power high enough to make them known and make a difference, those issues become standard and suffering perpetuates. Bitterness and distance increases. They did great talking about privilege and culturally hostile infrastructure, and how socioeconomic differences affect how people see and experience and move through the world. How there doesn’t have to be malice for real, lasting harm to be done, just ignorance and oversight.

Language barriers. Cultural and religious differences. Different goals and structures of support within families. The small-town solidarity of ethnic communities within large cities. The role of nostalgia. Talent and creativity and how that is nurtured based on priorities and the privileges we are born with/without. Generational trauma. Tokenism and fetishization. The universality of prejudice from every direction. MICROAGGRESSIONS.

And the characters!!! We love an emotionally stunted woman who has zero CSR skills - Ember is a disaster in a really uncommon way. I love it. And Wade is the sweetest lil puddle of empathy I’ve ever seen!!! My emotionally constipated ass felt some of his lines like a literal stab through the chest, he’s so sincere and compassionate at every turn and it’s both alarming and disarming. Talk about a soft boi who is also WHOLESOME and OBSERVANT. Wow. (Also I’ve been obsessed with Mamoudou Athie since I first saw him in Unicorn Store a few years ago - Black Box, Oh Jerome No, Archive 81, he’s SO good - and so is his VOICE ACTING!!! Whoa my dude)