Elio” isn’t up there with the animation house’s finest work — the glory days have been over for some time now — but it’s a fine, fizzy piece of family entertainment, overfamiliar in spots (if a story about multiple species of extraterrestrials can be called familiar) but just as overeager to please.

Pixar trades soul-searching for star-seeking in its most whimsical — and least self-serious — original cartoon in over a decade.

The animation company’s movie about an orphaned kid who wants to live with aliens doesn’t quite come together, but is still a fun ride for young audiences