Pixar weaves a fan­ta­sy of Ital­ian mer-boys in the first Luca trailer

For Pixar, the release-sched­ule log­jam caused by the dis­rup­tive, destruc­tive force of the pan­dem­ic has now cre­at­ed a peri­od of unusu­al­ly pro­lif­ic out­put. Onward debuted to luke­warm notices last spring, the more ambi­tious and well-liked Soul came online two short months ago, and we’re already less than four months out from their next orig­i­nal release.

Pixar unveiled the first trail­er for the forth­com­ing Luca this morn­ing, teas­ing a rounder and friend­lier ani­ma­tion style accom­pa­nied by a string-pluck­ing Ital­ian-lan­guage cov­er of ​‘You Are My Sun­shine’. The sound­track nice­ly befits the Riv­iera set­ting, where a pair of best friends soak up the sand and surf while con­ceal­ing a secret from the judge­men­tal vil­la they call home.

The trail­er reveals that its pro­tag­o­nists hap­pen to be mer-boys, trans­form­ing into amphibi­ous sea crea­tures when­ev­er exposed to water – not an ide­al posi­tion to be in, con­sid­er­ing the har­poon-hap­py her­itage of their sea­side inlet. When not bicy­cling around or exchang­ing odd­ly inti­mate glances while doing car­pen­try, the two boys hide their shared bond from their third friend, a local girl with a sus­pi­cious father and cat to match.

First-time fea­ture direc­tor Enri­co Casarosa, head of sto­ry on The Good Dinosaur, drew on his own expe­ri­ences of care­free sum­mers in rur­al Italy for this com­ing-of-age tale. The insert shots of stern-faced non­nas and col­or­ful hand-paint­ed exte­ri­ors speak to that speci­fici­ty of lived expe­ri­ence, whisk­ing us away to one of the dwin­dling num­ber of glob­al locales not yet explored by the Pixar oeuvre.

Maybe it’s the unde­ni­able evok­ing of Call Me by Your Name and The Shape of Water talk­ing, but it sure seems like the mer­man­ism shared by these two affec­tion­ate, close boys is sup­posed to be an ana­logue for the for­bid­den buds of first love. A quote from Casarosa clar­i­fies that ​“I love how the sea mon­ster is a won­der­ful metaphor for feel­ing dif­fer­ent,” but what could be more dif­fer­ent than being the one gay kid in a tight-knit, old-fash­ioned small town?

Luca will come to cin­e­mas in the UK and US on 18 June, the same day it will be made avail­able to stream on Disney+.