Animated 'Astro Boy' fueled by fun -- but has a conscience, as well
This movie had me at "What? I've got machine guns in my butt?"
The slick, computer-animated action film "Astro Boy" will probably not please fans of Tezuka Osamu's original 1952 Japanese "manga" comic book about the adventures of a superpowered boy robot on a vaguely distant futuristic world.
David Bowers' big-screen adaptation has been westernized out the ying-yang. Then, Saturday-morning-cartoonized on top of that.
But its thoughtfully selected voice cast, lean and quick pace, plus zillions of zany pop culture references make it joyously fun, even if originality isn't its strong suit.
I practically filled my notebook with these nifty, throwaway allusions to other works.
"Frankenstein" is in this movie. So is Steven Spielberg's "A.I." (via "Pinocchio"). And "Oliver Twist." And the gold-glowing briefcase from Quentin Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction." And arcanely enough, the old "Magnus: Robot Fighter" comic books.
The story takes place, as Charlize Theron's voice-over narration lectures us, on a world that has separated the haves from have-nots.
The snooty haves live in a super gleaming metropolis suspended in the sky called Metro City. The poor have-nots, represented by Kristen Bell's scrappy orphan Cora, scavenge around in the rubble on the planet's surface.
In Metro City, a young boy named Toby (voiced by Freddie Highmore) is the supersmart son of the super-smarter scientist Dr. Tenma (Nicolas Cage), working on a powerful energy core project that the inherently evil President Stone (Donald Sutherland in snake-hiss mode) thinks can help him win an upcoming election over his "hippie" challenger.
When an experiment goes haywire and disintegrates Toby, his despondent (and apparently single) father meticulously rebuilds him as a robot, complete with his son's appearance and memory.
As we later discover, Dad also gives his artificial son machine guns in his derrière, military firepower in his arms, jet packs in his feet and a few other nifty gimmicks that a James Bond Jr. would like.
Why pacifist Tenma would load artificial Toby with weapons of mass destruction is never explained, but Toby-2 appreciates them after President Stone commands his troops to hunt down the boy and retrieve his power source, a blue core that can be used for, of course, military applications.
(It seems strange that Bowers' movie paints the military as a villainous force, when Astro Boy himself can only solve problems with bullets, bombs and brute force.)
"I have an election to win!" Stone keeps repeating, as if he's concerned audiences will forget his motivation for being a ruthless jerk.
Unlike most simplistic animated plots, "Astro Boy" almost trips over too many really good ideas.
Metro City's dependence on a robotic work force clearly suggests a metaphor for slavery and racism. Dr. Tenma picks up on this at the end and "frees" his domestic robot, Orrin, voiced by Eugene Levy.
Cora's seemingly kind Fagin-like father figure Ham Egg (Nathan Lane) reveals his true nature by hosting gladiator death-matches between robots to entertain the bloodthirsty (oil-thirsty?) masses.
"They're just machines!" he says. But we instantly recognize the callousness of those who would justify violence by dehumanizing their targets.
"Astro Boy" isn't a great animated movie by any stretch.
It's an ambitious one, and a film that fits nicely into an Obama world view of unity and fairness.
<p class="factboxheadblack">"Astro Boy"</p> <p class="News">Three stars</p> <p class="News"><b>Starring: </b>Freddie Highmore, Nicolas Cage, Kristen Bell, Nathan Lane, Charlize Theron, Samuel L. Jackson, Eugene Levy, Bill Nighy, Donald Sutherland </p> <p class="News"><b>Directed by:</b> David Bowers</p> <p class="News"><b>Other:</b> A Summit Entertainment release. Rated PG. 94 minutes</p>