Starring: Leah Lewis, Mamoudou Athie, Ronnie del Carmen, Shila Ommi, Wendi McLendon-Covey, Catherine O’Hara
OUR RATING: ★★★☆☆
Story:
Disney/Pixar animated comedy adventure directed by Peter Sohn. Set in Element City, where fire, water, land, and air residents live together. Elemental (2023) follows Ember (Leah Lewis), a tough, quick-witted and fiery young woman, whose friendship with Wade (Mamoudou Athie), a fun, sappy, go-with-the-flow guy, challenges her beliefs about the world they live in.
Where to Watch:
Best Quotes
Bernie: Our Blue Flame hold all our traditions and give us strength to burn bright.
Bernie: [to Ember] This shop is dream of our family. Someday it’ll all be yours.
Ember: [to water customers] You splash it, you buy it.
Bernie: Nobody waters down Fire!
Sparkler Customer: The sparklers are buy one, get one free?
Ember: That’s right.
Sparkler Customer: Great! I’ll just take the free one.
Ember: Oh, no. See, you need to buy one to get one free.
Sparkler Customer: But I just want the free one.
Ember: Sorry, that’s not how this works.
Sparkler Customer: But the customer is always right.
Ember: Not in this case.
Bernie: [to Ember] Sometimes customer can be tough. Just take breath and make connection. When you can do that, and not lose temper, then you will be ready to take over shop.
Bernie: [to the customer] Oh, please forgive my daughter. She burn bright, but sometimes too bright. Eh?
Flarry: Bernie, that cough is terrible!
Flarrietta: Almost as terrible as your cooking!
Ember: We are more than ready for you to actually buy something, if you’d ever get up off your lazy ash.
'Embrace the light while it burns because it won't always last forever.' - Ember (Elemental) Share on X
Cinder: Just a loveless, sad future of sadness. Ember, work with me. Your finding match was my mother’s dying wish.
Clod: Anyway, June Bloom is coming, and you just got to be my date. Because check it out. I’m all grown up. And I smell good.
Clod: [plucks the flower from under his arm and offers it to Ember] Ow! My queen!
Ember: [takes the flower and it ignites] Sorry, buddy. Elements don’t mix.
Clod: Go to the festival with me. You never leave this part of town.
Ember: That’s because everything I need is right here. Plus, the city isn’t made with Fire people in mind. Sorry, but it’d take an act of God to get me across that bridge.
Clod: An act of God? Or an act of Clod?
Ember: Winner, winner, charcoal dinner!
Ember: Who are you? What are you doing here?
Wade: I don’t know. I was searching for a leak on the other side of the river and got sucked in. This is bad, I can’t lose another job. I just can’t seem to find my flow.
'I don't think a temper is so bad. Sometimes when I lose my temper, I think it's just me trying to tell me something I'm not ready to hear.' - Wade (Elemental) Share on X
Wade: The pipe squished me all out of shape.
Ember: I sucked a city inspector into our pipes?
Wade: I know. Ironic, right?
Wade: First, I’m sucked into a pipe, and now I have to write citations that could get this place shut down. Oh, gosh. It’s just too much.
Ember: This shop is my dad’s dream. If I’m the reason it gets shut down, it will kill him. He will never trust me to take over.
Wade: Why didn’t you say that before?
Ember: Wait. Does that mean you’ll tear up the tickets?
Wade: I mean, I would, but I just sent them over to the processing department.
Wade: Hey! Fern. How are you doing?
Fern: Living the dream.
Wade: You know those citations I just gave you from Fire Town?
Fern: I was about to them to Mrs. Cumulus, then get sprayed for fungus rot.
'There are a million reasons why this can't work. A million nos. But there's also one yes. We touched.' - Wade (Elemental) Share on X
Bernie: Water, always trying to water us down.
Ember: He was a Water person, Dad, not just water.
Wade: Oh, sorry! You’re so hot.
Ember: Excuse me?
Wade: No! I mean, like you’re smoking. No, I didn’t mean it like that.
Ember: Are you done yet?
Wade: Yes, please.
Vendor: Toot Toot juice. Get your Toot Toot juice.
Gale: Break some wind!
'You don't have forever to say what you need to say.' - Wade (Elemental) Share on X
Gale: This is the playoffs. So, forgive me if I don’t want to hear a sob story about the problems of some little shop!
Ember: Well, that little shop matters way more than a bunch of overpaid cloud puffs blowing some ball around.
Gale: I dare you, say “cloud puffs” one more time.
Ember: Cloud puffs.
Gale: [to Ember and Wade] You’re lucky you’re a cute couple.
Earth Pruner #1: [as they’re picking each other’s fruit] Nothing weird going on here.
Earth Pruner #2: Just a little pruning!
Wade: It must be nice knowing what you’re going to do. After my dad passed, I got all, “What’s the point?” Now I just go from one job to the next.
Ember: How do you do that?
Wade: Do what?
Ember: Draw people in? You got a whole stadium to connect with you. I can’t even connect with one customer. My stupid temper always kicks in.
Wade: I guess I just say what I feel. And I don’t think a temper is so bad. Sometimes when I lose my temper, I think it’s just me trying to tell me something I’m not ready to hear.
Ember: That’s ridiculous.
Wade: Maybe.
Wade: Any chance you’re free tomorrow? To hang out with a Water guy?
Ember: With a Water guy? My dad would boil you alive.
Bernie: It’s you again.
Wade: Who? Me?
Bernie: You’re the guy who started all this.
Ember: No, Dad. Different guy. Not all Water looks alike.
Wade: I’m a food inspector. I’ve come to inspect your food.
Bernie: I think he’s lying through his feet.
Ember: Teeth.
Wade: Whatever.
Ember: Food inspector?
Wade: I panicked.
Wade: [referring to the hot coals] Yep! All looks good to me.
Bernie: No, no, no, no. Inspect with your mouth.
Ember: [after Wade swallows the hot coal and yells] You see? He likes it!
Wade: [referring to the hot food] See? It’s really tasty if you water it down a little.
Bernie: Water us down? Water us down? Where’s camera? We will never be watered down by you. Get out!
Bernie: Water want to water us down? Then Water no longer allowed in shop. He is panned.
Ember: Banned.
Bernie: Banned!
Wade: Look, I know it can be tough. I mean, with my dad, we were like oil and water. I never got a chance to fix that. But you guys are different. It might be time to tell him.
Ember: Yeah, right. And tell him what? That I got us shut down and destroyed his dream?
Ember: You have no idea how hard they’ve worked. Or what they’ve had to endure. Family they left behind. How do you repay a sacrifice that big? It all feels like a burden. How can I say that? I’m a bad daughter.
Wade: Hey, no. You’re doing your best.
Ember: I’m a mess.
Wade: No. I think you’re even more beautiful.
Ember: [to Wade] Maybe you’re right when you said my temper is me trying to tell me something.
Ember: Are you crying?
Wade: Yes. I’ve just never been punched in the face with beauty before.
Bernie: Ember, I see a change in you. Happier, calmer with customers, and with that food inspector. Always putting shop first. You prove I can trust you. I’m so lucky I have you.
Brook: Ember! Oh, I’m so excited to finally meet you. Do we hug, or wave, or…? Don’t want to put you out.
Brook: [to Ember] Wade hasn’t stopped talking about you since the day you met. The boy is smitten.
Wade: Mom!
Brook: Oh, come on. I’m your mother. I know when something’s lighting you up. I just didn’t know she’d be so smoky.
Wade: That’s my brother Alan and his wife Eddy.
Alan: And we got two kids that are swimming around here somewhere. Marco! Polo!
Marco Ripple: [to Ember] Do you die if you fall in water?
Harold: Oh, I just dabble in watercolors. Or as we like to call them, “colors”.
Ember: My only talent is “Clean up on aisle four”.
Alan: Hey, Ember, did Wadey here ever tell you that he’s deathly afraid of sponges?
Ember: No.
Wade: I was traumatized.
Brook: I still can’t use a sponge around him.
Wade: I was stuck in there for hours.
Wade: Ooh, thought bubble. Maybe after dinner we play the crying game?
Ember: Let me guess. You try to cry?
Wade: We try not to cry.
Wade: Ember, when I met you, I thought I was drowning. But that light, that light inside you has made me feel so alive. And all I want now is to be near it. Near you. Together.
Gale: Hold the storm.
Brook: You have a bright future. Look at me, I have an original Ember.
Ember: I don’t think I actually do want to run the shop. Okay? That’s what my temper has been trying to tell me. I’m trapped.
Ember: Even when I was a kid, I would pray to the Blue Flame to be good enough to fill my father’s shoes someday, because this place is his dream. But I never once asked what I wanted to do. I think that’s because deep down, I knew it didn’t matter. Because the only way to repay a sacrifice so big is by sacrificing your life too.
Ember: [referring to Wade] Mom, it’s okay. He’s just a friend.
Cinder: Silence! I could smell you from over there. Oh, you stink.
Ember: What are you talking about?
Cinder: You know what I’m talking about.
Ember: You’re smelling love on me?
Cinder: Fire and Water cannot be together.
Bernie: But my father did not return the bow. Did not give me his blessing. He say, if we leave Fire Land, we will lose who we are.
Wade: [as they both easily merge through the chained link fence] Come on! Why do they even have these?
Ember: Eh, who knows.
Wade: Why does anyone get to tell you what you can do in your life?
Wade: [referring to touching each other] Let’s see what happens. And if it’s a disaster, then we’ll know this would never work.
Ember: But it actually could be a disaster. I could vaporize you. You could extinguish me, and then…
Wade: Let’s start small.
[they touch hands, finding out they are able to touch and embrace each other]
Wade: Where are you going?
Ember: Back to my life at the shop where I belong. I take over tomorrow.
Wade: Woh. Woh. Woh. Hold up. You don’t want that. You said so yourself.
Ember: It doesn’t matter what I want.
Wade: Of course it does.
Wade: You’ve got an opportunity to do something you want with your life.
Ember: “Want”? Yeah, that may work in your rich kid, “follow your heart” family, but getting to do what you want is a luxury, and not for people like me.
Wade: Funny. And this whole time, I thought you were so strong, but it turns out you’re just afraid.
Ember: Don’t you dare judge me. You don’t know what it’s like to have parents who gave up everything for you. I’m Fire, Wade. I can’t be anything more than that. It’s what I am and what my family is. It’s our way of life. I cannot throw all of that away just for you.
Wade: I don’t understand.
Ember: And that alone is a reason this could never work. It’s over, Wade.
Ember: What are you doing here?
Wade: You said me not understanding is the reason that we can never work. But I thought of other reasons. A bunch of them. Like, number one, you’re Fire, I’m Water. I mean, come on. That’s crazy. Right?
Wade: I’m crashing your party. Like what kind of a jerk am I?
Ember: A pretty big one.
Wade: There are a million reasons why this can’t work. A million nos. But there’s also one yes. We touched. And when we did, something happened to us, something impossible. We changed each other’s chemistry.
Bernie: What kind of food inspection is this?
Wade: A food inspection of the heart, sir.
Wade: Take the chance. Let your father know who you really are. Look, I had regrets when my dad died. But because of you, I learned to embrace the light while it burns. Tishok. You don’t have forever to say what you need to say. I love you, Ember Lumen. And I’m pretty sure you love me too.
Ember: No, Wade. I don’t.
Cinder: That’s not true. I did their reading. Bernie, it’s love. It’s true love.
Ember: No, Mom, you’re wrong. Wade, go.
Wade: But, Ember…
Ember: I don’t love you. Go!
Ember: Why can’t I just be a good daughter?
Wade: Well, one-way ticket to anywhere but here.
Brook: Go. Travel the world. Heal that broken heart. My little drip, drip baby boy.
Wade: I was hoping to make a more heroic entrance.
Ember: You came back, after everything I said.
Wade: Are you kidding? And miss all this?
Wade: I’m sorry to say this, but the shop is done. The flame is done.
Ember: No! This is my father’s whole life. I’m not going anywhere.
Wade: The water will come in and you’ll be snuffed out.
Ember: But you’re evaporating. I don’t know what to do.
Wade: It’s okay.
Ember: No, it’s not okay!
Wade: Ember, I have no regrets. You gave me something people search for their whole lives.
Ember: But I can’t exist in a world without you. I’m sorry I didn’t say it before. I love you, Wade.
Wade: I really do love it when your light does that.
Ember: [to Bernie] I need to tell you the truth. I don’t want to run the shop. I know that was your dream, but it’s not mine. I’m sorry. I’m a bad daughter.
Bernie: Ember, the shop was never the dream. You were the dream. You were always the dream.
Ember: [as she’s trying to make Wade cry] An old man on his deathbed remembers the summer he fell in love. She was out of his league, and he was young and scared. He let her go, thinking surely summer would come again. It never did.
Cinder: [to Wade, referring to him and Ember] You are perfect match. Ten out of ten!
Ember: I want to explore the world with you, Wade Ripple. I want to have you with me in my life. Forever.
Cinder: [as Ember and Wade are kissing] I knew it. My nose always knows.
Clod: If you were a vegetable, you’d be a cute-cumber.
Flarrietta: You know what I like best about running this shop?
Flarry: Not having to eat Bernie’s kol-nuts?
Bernie: Sorry, I couldn’t hear you through my retirement.
Wade: [as he’s crying] You know, I’m not really one for tearful goodbyes.
Brook: Oh, Wade. You big liar.
Brook: [crying] Drip, drip, drip…
Wade, Brook: Goes the baby boy!
Bernie: [to Ember] Go, start new life. Your mother and I will be here. Now, with more time for hanky-panky.