Sadly due to COVID-19 and theater closures Disney+ announced last week that the Pixar film Soul will be coming directly to the streaming platform this Christmas. This new film is not listed to be behind a paywall like Mulan, released earlier this year. While the news is bittersweet, at least when I undoubtedly start bawling my eyes out to the point where I can’t be quiet, this time I won’t be in a theater full of kids watching Frozen 2, so slight upside?
Soul follows Joe Gardner (Jamie Foxx), a middle-school band teacher and jazz musician. On the verge of his big break, he suddenly finds his soul has been separated from his body and now he’s on a journey through The Great Before with a new soul (voiced by Tina Fey). The inimitable Graham Norton revealed he is the voice of the “spiritual sign twirler” Moonwind. The cast also features an amazing array of performers that you’ve probably heard of, if only in passing: Rachel House, Alice Braga, Richard Ayoade, Wes Studi, Zenobia Shroff, Donell Rawlings, June Squibb, Phylicia Rashad, Questlove, Daveed Diggs, and Angela Bassett.
According to Kemp Powers: “We’ve been working on ‘Soul’ for years, but the film feels timelier now than we ever could have imagined back when we began,” said Powers. “In a year where everything we know has been turned upside down, we’ve all been forced to find new meaning both in the relationships we have and the small moments that truly make life worth living.”
