Elio Directors Reveal How Hard It Is to Make a Kid’s Movie About Grief & Loneliness

The filmmakers behind Pixar’s Elio open up about the delicate balance between crafting an entertaining family-friendly film and exploring some heavy themes. In an interview with ComicBook promoting Elio (which is out in theaters June 20th), co-directors Domee Shi and Madeline Sharafian discussed the titular character’s loneliness and how that presented challenges for them during development. It was key for them to figure out a way to portray Elio’s lighter side before diving too deep into more serious subject matter, allowing audiences to become enamored with his sense of wonder. There were also conversations about how much information viewers had to know regarding Elio’s backstory.

“We’re always very careful to do our research,” Sharafian said. “We talked to experts, we talked to loneliness psychologists about children’s loneliness and grief in particular. What is important about Elio is that there are layers to him, so when you first meet him and he’s trying to get abducted on the beach, you don’t get to see that lower layer. You just see that tenacious, curious, determined kid and you love him for that. You love that light side of him. So when you finally are able to dig in a little deeper to his vulnerabilities … I think you’re ready for a bit more heaviness.”

“We did a lot of trial and error,” Shi added. “We boarded whole versions of ‘how far back do we start the movie? How much do we actually see? How much information does the audience need?’ We would write it up … me and Maddy would quickly storyboard and cut it up and be like, ‘This is really heavy to start a family movie.’”

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The latest original film from Pixar, Elio is a sci-fi adventure about a young child who is having trouble fitting in. Desperate to find his place in the world, Elio wishes to be abducted by aliens — a wish that’s fulfilled when he’s picked up by a spaceship and finds himself on a mission to stop the villainous Lord Grigon from conquering his newfound home. Along the way, he befriends the alien Glordon, who is Lord Grigon’s son.

In both story and character design, Elio takes heavy inspiration from the Steven Spielberg classic E.T. – the Extra-Terrestrial, which similarly revolves around the unlikely friendship between a lonely boy and an alien. Elio’s name is an homage to E.T. protagonist Elliott.

Pixar has never been afraid to tackle serious topics in its films (see: the opening sequence of Up). It’s one of the reasons why the studio’s works resonate with audiences of all ages. Adults can appreciate the thoughtfulness Pixar puts into crafting its stories. There’s plenty of light-heartedness and humor that runs throughout Pixar films, of course, but the best ones are elevated by the emotional, poignant moments that strike a chord. It sounds like Elio is cut from the same cloth. Pixar’s research into grief indicates Elio is trying to process some sort of tragedy, which could explain some of his behavior seen in the film’s trailers. Given the delicate subject matter, it’s nice to see the Elio creative team went the extra mile to make sure what they were doing was accurate.

Elio is going to have its work cut out for it at the box office, opening just one week after the live-action How to Train Your Dragon remake (and roughly one month after Lilo & Stitch‘s record-breaking debut). It’ll be interesting to see how it fares since it’ll be facing such stiff competition for its target demographic. Considering how much work went into putting Elio‘s affecting narrative together, there’s a good chance the film generates positive word of mouth. If the reviews are strong, Pixar could have another hit original film on its hands.