UnReview: Meet the Robinsons, Disney Animation’s Return to Form

If you’ve been waiting since Lilo and Stitch or TheLion King for a Disney-animated movie to come along that you, your family, and friends could build the same kind of heart warming experiences around that you had as a kid, your wait is over.

Walt Disney Pictures’ Meet the Robinsons is the best animated film to come out of the Mouse House since that studio’s fabled second golden age of animation in the early ‘90s.

Meet the Robinsons is everything you use to expect of a Disney-animated film and more. It is exactly what a G-rated (General audience) film should be—entertaining and appealing for everyone from 5 to 95.

Although you’d probably never figure it out from the movie’s rather unimpressive trailer, Meet the Robinsons is the story of Lewis (Daniel Hansen and Jordan Fry), an extremely bright, inventive young orphan who longs nearly as much for a family of his own as he does to see his birth mother once again.

One day Lewis, who already has several clever inventions to his credit, comes to the realization that he already knows what his real mother looks like. He’s seen her, although at the time he was an infant staring into his mother’s face as she left him one rainy night, on the steps of an orphanage. All he has to do is to invent something that will help him go back in time and retrieve the memory of that night.

With a little help from roommate Mike “Goob” Ygoobian (Matthew Josten) and the support of his science teacher Mr. Willerstein (Tom Kenny), Lewis sets out to perfect the ‘Memory Scanner’. Posing as a Time Travel Agent, an energetic young lad named Wilbur Robinson (Wesley Singerman) approaches Lewis before he can even demonstrate his device. Robinson warns Lewis to be on the lookout for a mysterious character called Bowler Hat Guy (Steve Anderson).

Bowler Hat Guy, and his hench-hat Doris (Ethan Sandler), have been watching Lewis, and first manage to sabotage the Memory Scanner and then, after its sad and dejected inventor abandons it, steal the device for their own nefarious purposes.

Frustrated in his effort to keep Bowler Hat Guy away from Lewis and his invention, Wilbur soon realizes the only way to solve his problem is to help Lewis with his. Before Lewis can say yesterday, he’s whisked off to the future on an incredible time-traveling adventure.

Lewis’ journey takes him to a place even he couldn’t have imagined—a place where the impossible no longer exists: the future. There, Lewis encounters a family unlike any other—the sublimely funny and futuristic Robinsons—who will help him with some of the most important discoveries of his young life, not the least of which is his own limitless potential.

Not unlike Disneyland’s famous Space Mountain, which makes a brief cameo appearance in Future City, Meet the Robinsons is also something of a rollercoaster ride. In the words of a friend, “it’s sweet, funny, and quirky,” all at the same time. The characters and settings, inspired by the William Joyce children’s book A Day with Wilbur Robinson, are beautifully detailed and draw the audience—no pun intended—into the story. This is especially true of the Disney Digital 3D experience, which is among the clearest and brightest 3D yet.

Ultimately, it’s the story of Lewis’ journey of discovery, hilariously and touchingly told, in a series of unfolding revels that makes Meet the Robinsons truly worthy of being called a new Disney Classic. It is a ‘message movie’ and director Stephen Anderson and his team of writers, artists, and animators deliver that message without over sentimentalizing it one bit.

Like a lot of films, Meet the Robinsons drags slightly in the second act and the transition to act three is bumpy. After its dark beginning, however, the emotional payoff of the third act is so uplifting and genuine it had grown men weeping—and that was at a critics screening!

Undoubtedly, some of that roughness had to do with the changes in creative control and management that took place last year at Disney animation. Earlier this month at Disney’s annual meeting, John Lasseter, the creative leader of Walt Disney Animation Studios, talked about meeting Steve Anderson and seeing Meet the Robinsons for the first time. Even though the film was over two-thirds of the way through production, Lasseter urged Anderson, an orphan himself, to go back and personalize Lewis’ story with his own.

The notes Anderson received from Lasseter, Disney/Pixar president Ed Catmull, and some of the creative folks at Pixar Animation Studio resulted in pushing back the release of the film from the 2006 fall holiday season to spring of 2007, and many hours of overtime. It was money well spent.

Meet the Robinsons is not a musical like The Lion King; however, like Disney’s Tarzan, it has some wonderful songs written for the film by Rufus Wainwright, and Rob Thomas. Additionally, British singer, songwriter Jamie Cullum does a bang up job as the singing voice of Frankie the Frog, a big band crooner and the Danny Elfman soundtrack is as clear and bright as the images on the screen.

Although the voice cast includes fine performances by Angela Bassett, as Mildred, and Tom Selleck, in a small but pivotal role, Robinsons breaks with the current trend of casting “bankable big-name” film and television stars in the leading roles. Wesley Singerman gives voice to a 13-year-old Wilbur Robinson that everyone from Baby Boomers to Gen Y’ers can identify with. Equally up to the task are Daniel Hansen and Jordan Fry, who voice Lewis across the full spectrum of childhood emotion. Veteran performers Tom Kenny, Laurie Metcalf, and Adam West round out the superb cast.

Meet the Robinsons is the first Disney CG-animated film designed specifically to be exhibited in digital 3D. It will be shown in Disney Digital 3D on over 600 screens nationwide, making it possible for audiences in virtually every major city in the country to see it in 3D.

Whether you seek out a digital 3D screening or just visit your neighborhood multiplex, you should go see Meet the Robinsons as soon as possible, and start your next round of memorable Disney-animated movie-going experiences!