With the exception of the tot-friendly, adult-numbing “The Good Dinosaur” (2015), “Luca” is as much of a trifle as the Pixar Animation Studios have ever come up with. That sounds like a harsh judgment ...

Family films rarely succeed at one level of storytelling, so it’s particularly impressive that “Luca” operates so well on multiple levels. For children, this is a story about friendship and being true ...