Onward (Dir. Dan Scanlon, 1h 39m)

The films of Pixar, as with the best that cinema has to offer, have a great knack of dealing with complex concepts, from existentialism and our purpose in being alive via children's toys, to environmentalism via a robotic love story, to the fears of fatherhood in a clownfish and his son, to dealing with loss and old age via the adventures of an old man and his balloon-borne house. Onward, in that respect, is no different, in which a duo of teenage boys, the shy and quiet Ian (Tom Holland), and his wilder older brother, Barley (Chris Pratt) struggle with the loss of their father, and attempt to piece together who he was and what he meant to each of them on a cross-country road trip, encountering scrapes, odd characters as they journey towards an elusive final meeting with their lost parent.


Where it differs, is in this matching of this personal journey for the elven siblings to the language, imagery and veritable paraphernalia of the fantasy quest. Thus with the setting a smartly modernised version of the archetypal high fantasy world beloved by Tolkien and his imitators, not to mention tabletop games such as Dungeons and Dragons, and videogames such as Warcraft and the like, so the brother's journey becomes an epic quest. Having been bequeathed a magic staff by their late father, in a,  world where magic was long supplanted by technology, and with a spell having brought back only the lower half of their father, so the duo-and-a-half, guided by Barley's beloved Quests of Yore, which takes its basis from the real events of the once magical world, so they must set out to find a crystal which will grant them the power to summon the rest of their father, and spend one last day in his company.


Above all things, this film adores its setting-it would be easy, as some films have done, such as the exorable Will Smith featuring Bright to play lazy with a lot of the modernisation, to make the villainous races of fantasy adversarial, or even to play lazy ethnic stereotype with certain fantasy races-hell, even Tolkien and the more enlightened of his contemporaries fell into this trap. But Onward's masterstroke is, quite honestly, in its normality-unicorns are trash-eating pests, dragons are domestic pets, manticores run restaurants, and our hero's class is made up of everything from trolls to goblins. Nevertheless, as our heroes begin to leave their decidedly middle-American coded home town behind, more traditionally fantastical elements begin to appear, complete with Middle-Earthish
vistas, dungeons, perilous quests and strange allies along their quest.


And, quite honestly, as someone who adores high fantasy, who plays Dungeons and Dragons, who writes a webcomic that apes the typical Dungeons and Dragons quest where a group of heroes go out to right wrongs and make a name for themselves, there's something refreshing about this world, from our heroes outward, not only in this modernising of setting, but in the designs, in the detail, in the care put into this world, from the look of our heroes, with a light blue tint to hair and skin that neatly subverts typical depictions, to the various fantasy races that they meet and interact with along the way, from impressively violent biker pixies, to Octavia Spencer's Corey, a former quest-giving manticore who eventually teams up with the brother's mother (Julia Louis-Dreyfuss) to go on a quest of their own.
This is not to mention the film's depiction of magic, wielded by Ian, with which he gains an increasing confidence as the journey goes on-whilst the comparison with that other film made by Disney involving magic and siblings is undeniable, it's enjoyable to see a world in which magic is, rather than feared, regarded as more of an oddity or old-fashioned, and it's one of the few aspects I personally wish the film had gone into more..


But, for all its fantasy setting, for all its set dressing, what this film is at heart, is a road movie of self-discovery-our heroes may be looking for another source of magical power in order to bring the remaining half of their father back for one last day, but this film is, unmistably about that loss of a parent, particularly in the case of Ian (and indeed director Scanlon), a parent they never truly knew, as well as the connection between brothers. Here the film is beautiful, if almost uncomfortably frank. In one scene, Ian, replaying a tape of the only recording of his father's voice, "holds" a conversation with the father he never knew, whilst elsewhere, a chance meeting with one of his father's classmates leads to Ian trying to be more like his father to mixed results. Though the boy's father is physically present, it is as an (impressively comic) pair of legs, who plays both comic foil, and unexpected emotional centre of the film, with a couple of scenes in particular genuinely affecting despite little to no dialogue being spoken.

Even beyond this, however, this is a film about brotherhood; the bond between Ian and Barley is tested several times, at points almost to breaking point, with each brother taking fault with the other-Ian is undeniably a shy and retiring figure, seemingly scared of everything, and trying to take the "easy" route from his brother's perspective, whilst Barley's blustering exterior, his geekish personality, and his obsession with his van, hides a less cocksure figure, who is regarded as a goof and a loser by those around him. That the film manages to bring them back together for the finale, that the film manages to give them closure and personal growth, and that the film's focus on the fraternal bond is given equal weight as the exploration of their father is to its credit, with the denouement wrapping these up together neatly.

As the best of Pixar's output over the last quarter of a century, Onward is a film that perfectly encapsules this concept, whilst still telling a fantastic(al) story with all of their normal wit and charm. Onward, thus, is not just a film about an epic fantasy road trip to reunite with the other half of your partially corporeal father, nor a film about bringing a little magic back into a world that has moved on. At its centre, it is a superbly told film about universal things like closure and coming to terms with the loss of a parent, the importance of our family in who we are as people and about the bonds between brothers, even if these brothers are elves adventuring in a beaten up van. Simply put, it nimbly matches its story of an epic quest with a sweet and deeply personal story of parental loss and brotherhood.

Rating: Highly Recommended