By Lars Lindahl, high school student © 1999 Lars Lindahl
"The Iron Giant" (***1/2) (out of four stars)
Directed by Brad Bird Written by Brad Bird and Tim McCanlies Starring the voices of Eli Marienthal, Vin Diesel, Jennifer Aniston, Harry Connick Jr., Christopher McDonald, John Mahoney, James Gammon, Cloris Leachman, M. Emmet Walsh
"The Iron Giant" is a great achievement in feature length animation. It is one of the few this decade to simultaneously teach a valuable lesson, entertain all ages, and accurately reenter an era of America's regretful past. The best part about this film is that it actually captures a number of distinct emotions and characters of our recent past half a century ago. Through the reaction to the entrance of this foreign giant, paranoia and trust battle each other out and determine the fate of the situation. This battle creates an intense, depressing, and humorous outcome. The stable balance of these three factors makes "The Iron Giant" so special. It contradicts the spreading trend of just using animation to create wacky and unimaginable characters. The characters most definitely have existed in this time of American history and "The Iron Giant" uses this reality to create real emotions and understandable decisions from both perspectives. The film is also an argument that the government is mainly to blame for the Cold War. By making the army and a government agent the villains, the film shows that America is fighting America. One part of this country did not blow situations out of proportion and examined them before making decisions. Another part of this country decided before they examined that anything foreign or new was a threat to the country. A number of times the film tells the giant (and the audience) to choose who they are for themselves without outside interference. "The Iron Giant" mainly is an argument against the use of violence to solve issues. It asks the question of who to follow in a time of crisis, yourself or the mass majority (in this case the government and army).
These messages are given within the plot which is mostly formulaic except for its fantastic, heart pounding ending. This is not to say that formulaic is bad. "The Iron Giant" can be easily compared to "E.T." and equals it in its process of story telling and lesson teaching. The story takes place in a small town in Maine during 1957, a time when nuclear attacks were feared and B-horror movies thrived. A number of spoofs involving the culture of the time are cleverly added into the script which should entertain adults who grew up during that time period. A young boy, Hogarth Hughes, (Eli Marienthal in a wonderful vocal performance) discovers an iron giant (Vin Diesel) near his town and develops a secret friendship with it. Hogarth teaches the giant how to say basic words, he teaches him that killing is bad and death should be natural, and he teaches him to behave like superman protecting the innocent citizens from danger. However, this relationship is endangered when the army sets out to destroy it no matter who gets in the way. Christopher McDonald, who always seems to play the bad guy nowadays, voices Kent Mansley, the man determined to bring the robot down at all costs by calling in the army once he receives evidence.
This film proves that animated feature length films can definitely appear on a film critic's top ten list of movies of the year. Its spectacular ending wraps together a large amount of the Cold War. The paranoia, the control of the government, and the fear of foreigners entering the home front. The animation in the film also deserves credit for its great story telling. Brad Bird masterfully uses close ups and long shots in a number of scenes. He focuses on a close up, then slowly blurs it out and closes in on an image farther away. This style of drawing is very effective because it makes the scenery more real and as a result makes the content more believable. "The Iron Giant" is the best animated film since "The Lion King" and it deserves even more credit because it does not have the comfortable cushion of Disney marketing and advertising. A wonderful film only held back by some hackneyed lines and scenes. The positives greatly outweigh the negatives in every category.
© 1999 Lars Lindahl
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