He’s a classic Japanese character and a long-time cartoon cult favorite. Last summer “Astro Boy” hit the big screen, with help from his friends in Hong Kong.
“Astro Boy” is set in futuristic Metro City, where robots are smart and helpful, doing practically everything for the humans. The top robotic scientist in the land watches as his young son dies in a laboratory accident. The scientist decides to re-create his son, as a robot.
However, the scientist (who’s voiced by Nicholas Cage) soon realizes that he can’t love the robot boy, so the boy leaves home and hooks-up with a group of human kids, who have also left their homes. Meantime, the evil president of Metro City wants to capture Astro Boy, who has incredible powers and destroy him.
The plot of the movie turned out to be a little different than I expected. There’s a little bit of Pinocchio in it, mixed with some serious elements dealing with love, friendship and betrayal. It’s not a comedy, though director David Powers, the man behind the very funny “Flushed Away”, tries to inject humor through some supporting character robots that seem like bad rip-offs from the 2007 movie “Robots”. It doesn’t work.
The animation in “Astro Boy”is cool looking, with a lot of soft colors. And practically everything has round edges. Hong Kong’s Imagi Studios gets the credit. They were also responsible for the great look of 2007’s “TMNT”. Unfortunately, because “Astro Boy” did so poorly at the box office, Imagi was shutdown in February.
As for the voices, Freddie Highmore is perfect as the young boy and Astro Boy. Donald Sutherland, Nathan Lane and Kristen Bell join Cage in the all-star cast.
Was “Astro Boy” one of the best animated films of 2009? No. The story becomes predictable and there are too many scenes where the script tries to grab you emotionally and fails. But it’s definitely worth seeing if you missed it when it was out.
On The Official Kid Critic Report Card, “Astro Boy” gets a B.
It’s rated PG for some mild cartoon violence, but it’s appropriate for practically everyone. However, there’s really not a lot of action so kids (and adults) expecting to see a high-energy, action-packed animated adventure will be a little disappointed.