Pixar’s Lu isn’t a gay romance, or a romance at all, says director - Polygon

Contents:

• HOW GAY IS PIXAR’S LU?
• LU MAY NOT BE A GAY NARRATIVE, BUT ’S ABSOLUTELY A QUEER ONE
• SORRY, FOLKS, PIXAR’S LU ISN’T GAY
• I'M SORRY, BUT "LU" IS TOTALLY A GAY MOVIE, AND THE 18 TWEETS PROVE IT
• LU DIRECTOR SAYS DISNEY FILM NEARLY FEATURED GAY ROMANCE BETWEEN MA CHARACTERS: ‘WE TALKED ABOUT ’
• DO DISNEY’S ‘LU’ HAVE A GAY CHARACTER?
• 'LU' DIRECTOR ADMS THEY 'TALKED ABOUT' MAKG THE LEADS GAY BUT CID TO FOC ON A 'PRE-ROMANCE' IENDSHIP
• LU FANS ARE NVCED 'S A GAY LOVE STORY AND THE MEM ARE INIC
• PIXAR REPORTEDLY SCRAPPED GAY ‘LU’ STORYLE: ‘HOW DO WE DO THIS WHOUT A LOVE INTERT?’
• WA A SEC — ARE THE MA CHARACTERS PIXAR’S ‘LU’ GAY?

HOW GAY IS PIXAR’S LU?

That outle holds an obv potential for queer allegory, and ed many Pixar fans trackg the film’s velopment quickly labeled Lu as the stud’s “gay movie”—a g-out story to be placed on Pixar’s mantle alongsi s medatns on grief, artistic exprsn, lonels, Ayn Rand-ian objectivism, and parentg. Casarosa has explicly said that the film is not a queer story, that is all “platonic” and termedly “pre-pubcent.” That suggts a limed unrstandg of gay growg up, particularly of when our feelgs of affectn and special closens and difference n first velop. Lu is marketed as a "metaphor for anythg" but the sea monster setup is a perfect allegory for a gay story, and LGBTQ viewers n read that way.

Lu has arrived on Disney+ and, spe what Pixar says, the movie prents a strong allegory for growg up gay and fdg a nnectn wh other LGBTQ people. This elis the fact that beg gay, queer, or LGBTQ+ is not simply a matter of partners or relatnships or sex. Young gay people often feel very different om others before such feelgs velop, which n occur squarely the age bracket the story plac Lu and Alberto.

In the ments, Casarosa is enuragg such terpretatn, meang that, if you see there, Lu is a gay story, Pixar's first feature film wh LGBTQ+ leads.

LU MAY NOT BE A GAY NARRATIVE, BUT ’S ABSOLUTELY A QUEER ONE

The parallels of the boys secretly beg sea monsters and gay and LGBTQ+ people beg forced to hi their inti cuts closer than other mory groups, ratnalizg a queer readg of the movie.

So while Pixar ni Lu is a gay story due to s settg and the age of s characters, viewers should read the LGBTQ+ narrative for what is.

SORRY, FOLKS, PIXAR’S LU ISN’T GAY

The film's director said 's about iendships, but many viewers observed a strong gay subtext.

Alberto and Lu's relatnship is laced wh gay subtextLu is immediately taken by the ee-spired Alberto when he meets a fellow sea monster off the ast of 're sually physil wh each other, sleepg si by si unr a star-filled sky, wrappg their arms around each other's waists, and watchg the sunset together.

I'M SORRY, BUT "LU" IS TOTALLY A GAY MOVIE, AND THE 18 TWEETS PROVE IT

"This might seem rehg to some, to see a Disney movie explore iendships as opposed to a fairy-tale love story, but s a shame that this cisn has e when a gay romance uld have so easily and naturally be Lu and Alberto explicly gay or queer wouldn't have felt ntrived. It would have been a meangful nfirmatn of what is already a story rich gay subtext.

"Bety and the Beast" and "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker" both featured blk-and-you'll-miss- "gay moments:" a dance between two men and a kiss between two women.

LU DIRECTOR SAYS DISNEY FILM NEARLY FEATURED GAY ROMANCE BETWEEN MA CHARACTERS: ‘WE TALKED ABOUT ’

Queer kids will still feel forted by this story bee the scene plays out like an allegory for g out and beg gay, even if Casarosa said isn't.

—ClassicMovieGay (@jblikmovi) June 19, 2021What would have ma even more powerful, though, is if the movie explicly embraced the unniable queer subtext through dialogue.

Instead, Disney seems happy to let dienc terpret the movie their own way — (almost) satisfyg LGBTQ dienc wh a movie that feels gay but actually isn't, whout beg brave enough to prent an openly queer story. When director Enri Casarosa says he didn’t tend to make Lu a gay romance, I believe him.

DO DISNEY’S ‘LU’ HAVE A GAY CHARACTER?

OK, but isn’t still a ltle b gay? Still, there have been so many siar discsns about queer inty Disney movi that you n almost predict the disurse ahead of time: “They’re gay! ” “But why do they have to be gay?

” “But why n’t they be gay?

'LU' DIRECTOR ADMS THEY 'TALKED ABOUT' MAKG THE LEADS GAY BUT CID TO FOC ON A 'PRE-ROMANCE' IENDSHIP

For both live-actn and animated movi, the stud has overhyped what have bee known as “exclively gay moments, ” ty morsels of reprentatn that are eher so subtle you hardly notice them (a kiss between two women the background of a Star Wars movie) or so plot-irrelevant that they n be easily chopped or overlooked by ternatnal censors (here’s lookg at you, Endgame’s unnamed Grievg Man).

Meanwhile, while Disney has ngratulated self and claimed to blaze new trails, plenty of other animatn studs have been ahead of them: Laika’s ParaNorman, for example, featured an openly gay character way back 2012. Ironilly, the Disney movie that gave the term “exclively gay moment” the first place took a different tack: The live-actn Bety and the Beast’s LeFou is more the spir of the stud’s long-standg tradn of strongly queer-d, if not explicly gay, villas. Fans have sce picked up on homoerotic unrton Raya and the Last Dragon and the live-actn Mulan, but the movi rema rabow Rorschach tts, wh dienc havg to read between the l or project their own meangs to fd queer reprentatn.

LU FANS ARE NVCED 'S A GAY LOVE STORY AND THE MEM ARE INIC

How gay is ?

Whatever the director’s stated tent, the answer seems to be: as gay as you want to be. In rponse to viewers who reacted to trailers by hopg the film might be a childhood gay romance, Lu director Enri Casarosa rapidly shut the notn down, sayg “I was really keen to talk about a iendship before girliends and boyiends e to plite thgs.

PIXAR REPORTEDLY SCRAPPED GAY ‘LU’ STORYLE: ‘HOW DO WE DO THIS WHOUT A LOVE INTERT?’

The Deep is portrayed as horrible place of self-nial, but they’re willg to make him suffer to keep him away om what they see as immoral, a clear parallel to the nversn therapy or wilrns therapy that so many young LGBTQ+ people are subjected to by homophobic muni. His rponse was simple: “I’d say is meant to be terpreted by the viewer […] If you thk Le is gay, of urse he is.

” Hal regnized that some people benefted om readg the character as gay, and acknowledged that there isn’t a sgle rrect terpretatn of Le.

When Pixar first revealed the plot synopsis of s upg movie Lu — a tale of two sea-monster boys named Lu and Alberto, and an “unfettable” summer on the Italian Rivera — many people quickly pared to Call Me By Your Name, the 2017 gay romance that also took place durg an unfettable summer Italy. But 2020, Pixar released “Out” through s SparkShorts program, which centered around a gay uple. Eager for reprentatn, many fans have clung to the possibily that Lu might give them openly gay ma characters, and not jt one-note si characters.

WA A SEC — ARE THE MA CHARACTERS PIXAR’S ‘LU’ GAY?

No one lov a 'first gay character' more than Disney.

Disney has been que a b of hot, gay water recent years.

The pany has never been known for s great LGBTQ+ reprentatn or polics, but 's e unr even more scty than ual after fans learned that the pany was donatg money to legislators Florida backg that state's ntroversial "Don't Say Gay" bill. Especially when the news broke that Pixar has been censorg gay ntent out of s films for Disney really been producg enough spirg ntent to unteract s donatns and lack of a statement? RELATED | 11 Gay, Bi, & Lbian Creators Who Ma Disney What It Is Today.