A lot of movies can be described as fish-out-of-water stories, but few quite as literally as “Luca.” The title character, voiced by Jacob Tremblay, is an aquatic creature who lives with his family off the Mediterranean coast of Italy.
Like many a Disney protagonist before him — Ariel, Nemo and Moana all come to mind — he defies parental authority in the name of adventure.
On a rocky island near his home, he meets Alberto , a fellow changeling and a wild, parentless Huck Finn to Luca’s more cautious Tom Sawyer.
Instead of philosophical and cinematic ambition, there is a diverting, somewhat familiar story about friendship, loyalty and competition set against a picturesque animated backdrop.
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The friendship between Alberto and Luca, built around the fantasy of owning a Vespa and threatened by a desperate act of betrayal, carries a faint but detectable echo of “Shoeshine,” Vittorio De Sica’s neorealist fable about two Roman street urchins who dream of buying a horse.
That’s one of the saddest movies ever.
Their nemesis is Ercole , a preening bully with two nasty sidekicks, who threatens Luca and Alberto with humiliation and, worse, exposure to the harpoons of the sea-monster-hating townsfolk.
But the movie is too busy with its many plots — and too enchanted by its summery, touristic mood — to linger over bad feelings or grim possibilities.