This year has had some soul-crushing moments in all aspects of life and the movie theater industry has definitely taken a super-hard hit.
Earlier this year, we found out that the anticipated history-making Pixar film Soul wasn’t going to be premiering on Juneteenth as originally planned and was being pushed to November. Because Soul is the animation studio’s first Black-led film, that particular original release date had been perfect.
As expected, Soul will not be debuting in theaters at all and will instead head to Disney+, Deadline reported on Thursday. We won’t be able to ingest this film in theaters, but it looks like we’ll be watching Pixar’s Blackest film to date right at home. I guess we can make it a dinner and a movie moment and whip up a delicious platter of soul food (instead of sneaking it into the theater).
More about Soul, via the Disney+ press release sent to The Root:
What is it that makes you...YOU? Pixar Animation Studios’ Soul introduces Joe Gardner (voice of Jamie Foxx) – a middle-school band teacher who gets the chance of a lifetime to play at the best jazz club in town. But one small misstep takes him from the streets of New York City to The Great Before – a fantastical place where new souls get their personalities, quirks and interests before they go to Earth. Determined to return to his life, Joe teams up with a precocious soul, 22 (voice of Tina Fey), who has never understood the appeal of the human experience. As Joe desperately tries to show 22 what’s great about living, he may just discover the answers to some of life’s most important questions. Soul is Directed by Academy Award winner Pete Docter (Inside Out, Up), co-directed by Kemp Powers (One Night in Miami) and produced by Academy Award nominee Dana Murray, p.g.a. (Pixar short Lou).
“The world can be an exhausting and frustrating place—but it’s also full of unexpected joys, even in seemingly mundane things,” Pixar Animation Studios Chief Creative Officer Docter, who is co-directing this film with Powers, said in a statement. “Soul investigates what’s really important in our lives, a question we’re all asking these days. I hope it will bring some humor and fun to people at a time when everyone can surely use that.”
I hope so, too.
Plus, Pixar is also making a documentary that chronicles the journey of finishing Soul during COVID-19 quarantine guidelines, per Entertainment Weekly. According to the film’s producer Dana Murray, the team had “seven weeks of production left” after shelter-in-place ordinances were implemented in the U.S. back in March.
“I guess we were really lucky and blessed of where we were at in production because the back-end is highly technical. So, people were able to literally grab their machines and go home with them, and we were up and running in a day or two,” Murray noted. “Our systems team is incredible. Everyone was just really resilient.”
Soul makes its grand debut on Dec. 25 exclusively on Disney+. The film will be released theatrically in international markets and other markets where Disney+ isn’t available.