Soul is a fantastical animation about a school teacher who has lost his passion for music. Upon finally getting his big break, our leading character, Joe Gardner (Jamie Foxx), is accidentally separated from his soul and must reunite it with his body with the help of an infant soul, 22, (Tina Fey) who is also learning about herself and the world.
Soul really is an imaginative feat. Pixar knocked it out of the park with the likes of Up, Coco and Inside Out in particular, and Soul gives you all of those same fuzzy feelings on a backdrop of pure wonder and imagination. The animation is stellar, from the fine details on our central characters and the photorealism of New York City, to the abstract and very ethereal beings in the ‘Great Before’. When Joe is in New York City, it’s almost too realistic that you have to do a double take; the animation team have included everything that makes NYC the city that never sleeps, from the chaotic and overcrowded sidewalks, to the frenzied noises of sirens and traffic, and even with the accuracy of how bleak and joyless it feels to ride the subways.