Pixar‘s newest film Elemental is set to be one of the biggest theatrical hits of the summer, and the latest milestone in innovative storytelling for the studio. After getting standing ovations on the international film festival circuit, audiences everywhere are certain to give similar praise when it hits the big screen. As if there wasn’t enough fascinating backstory behind the making of Elemental, an aspect of it that people probably wouldn’t expect is the inclusion of a fictional language created just for the film. Per a report from Slash Film, the masterful mind behind it is none other than the legendary David J. Peterson, who underwent probably the most creative process yet in crafting a language from scratch.
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Related: Elemental Review: Pixar Enchants with Romance and Stunning CGI Animation
Elemental is the latest original film from Pixar Studios, helmed by Peter Sohn who has worked on the majority of their animated features in some capacity since The Iron Giant back in 1999. He’s brought together some of the biggest creative minds at his disposal for the project, including a particularly talented man named David J. Peterson. For those unaware, Peterson is one of the greatest purveyors of ‘conlang’, the universal term for “constructed language”, in the film and television industry right now. He’s manifested both written and spoken fictional languages for some of the biggest productions, including films like Marvel’s Thor: The Dark World (2013) and Doctor Strange (2016), as well as another of Disney’s films titled Raya and the Last Dragon (2021). He also created the languages of Chakobsa and Sardaukar for Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part One (2021), as well as the unique sign language used by House Atreides. He’s perhaps most prominently known for his work on Netflix’s series adaptation of The Witcher, and of course HBO’s Game of Thrones. He brought to life the language of the Dothraki, as well as Mag Nuk used by the Giants, along with High Valyrian and its subsets. He even developed other languages ultimately not used for the show, such as Asshai, Lhazareen which is a sister language of Dothraki, and Gerna Mohr, which would have been the language of the Children of the Forest.
Peterson’s Work on Elemental
Image via Pixar
When it came to developing a language for a film like Elemental, Peterson had to get even more creative than usual, and his inspiration started from a very interesting source. The language in question is officially called ‘Firish’, used by the Fire people, including those like Ember and her family who immigrated to Fire Town in Element City. Per a tweet by Disney Animation Promos, Firish is “based on fire sounds that represent Ember[‘s] family’s native tongue, and as shown in the photos, Firish indeed has its own written and spoken language.
Director Peter Sohn praised Peterson’s exceptional work on the linguistics of fire, mentioning that he literally took sounds emitted from a burning fireplace and worked from there. A crackling noise or two behind real language like English wasn’t nearly enough, and he went beyond the extra mile to literally create a standalone, fire-inspired lingo that gave even further depth and fascination to the characters behind it.
Elemental is set to release in theaters this weekend on June 16. Check out the latest trailer below.
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