Alternately high-tech and psychedelic, Titan A.E. is unlike any other Don Bluth-directed film. Arguably the most original Bluth film since The Secret of NIMH , Titan A.E. invites no comparison to Disney's classics. Instead, Titan A.E. owes a lot to older "science fiction" blockbusters like Battlestar Galactica and Star Wars. And, like blockbusters past and present, Titan A.E. succeeds with breathtaking visuals. Titan A.E. is far superior to The Phantom Menace, and hearkens back to a day when Hollywood blockbusters were escapist without excessive violence and commercial without being overcommercialized. And yet, Titan A.E. underperformed at the box office and polarized critics.
The film's graphic design is stunning. Computer-generated graphics are deftly mixed with traditional cel animation, and while this isn't the first time this has been done, it's hard to think of another film that consistently combines both classic and computer animation. The character designs are mostly realistic and despite the cutting-edge feel of the film, the character designers steered away from an anime-influenced look. The result is a film that looks like a contemporary graphic novel brought to life. Absolutely nothing in the film looks like it would belong in a Disney film, a true shock coming from Bluth, whose career was spent trying to out-Disney Disney.
The plot will seem vaguely familiar to fans of Battlestar Galactica, but not in a bad way. Unlike the disasterous Dreamworks TV miniseries Invasion America, Titan A.E.'s plot borrows from previous science fiction films without seeming derivative or imitative. In the opening minutes of the movie, the Earth is blown up by an alien race, and young Cale (voiced by Matt Damon) is designated a messiah of sorts by his scientist father. In the early parts of the film, WHO comes to terms with his legacy, falls in love with Akima (voiced by Drew Barrymore), and becomes part of interstellar rogue team attempting to reach a spacecraft called the Titan. The Titan is the key to humanity's survival in the post-Earth era, and we learn why in the last half hour of the film, which borrows heavily from the 1978 version of Superman, in which Kryptonian crystals build the Fortress of Solitude before Clark Kent's eyes.
Titan A.E. is a flawed film, just as so many other Hollywood productions nowadays. The villainy is unmotivated, and there is an unrealistic eleventh hour redemption of a traitorous character. It's especially unfortunate that the villains are as one-dimensional as the Stormtroopers in Star Wars, but this is a common problem in Hollywood science-fiction. Furthermore, the modern rock score, while competent, doesn't seem to add anything to the film aside from background noise. The film isn't long enough to fully explore the cosmic repercussions of the plot; it feels like a half hour or more was sliced from the screenplay.
On the other hand, it's hard not to applaud a film like this one. Surprisingly, Titan A.E. was not based on a comic book or well known popular fiction, but was an original screenplay. Aside from Heavy Metal and now-forgotten 80s flicks like Rock and Rule, Titan A.E. is an honorable attempt to bring a more mature, science-fiction subject matter to a genre typically dominated by children's movies.
Truth be told, science fiction films are just as formula-driven as westerns
or horror movies. I believe some of the negative reviews given to Titan
A.E. are part of a critical backlash against Starship Troopers,
Phantom Menace, and a host of other poorly-scripted "epics" - the
sort of films where the director hasn't got a clue and the special effects
teams are given a blank check to create anything they wish, regardless
of taste or style. Titan A.E. doesn't deserve to be put in
the same category as those films. Rent Titan A.E. and see for yourself.
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