{"id":4016,"date":"2024-09-14T15:24:13","date_gmt":"2024-09-14T15:24:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=4016"},"modified":"2024-10-12T20:48:16","modified_gmt":"2024-10-12T20:48:16","slug":"the-iron-giant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/09\/14\/the-iron-giant\/","title":{"rendered":"The Iron Giant"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The Iron Giant <\/strong>(1999)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Warner Bros.\/Sci-Fi-Action-Adventure\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 87 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG (fantasy action violence, language, some thematic material)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Brad Bird\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Tim McCanlies\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Michael Kamen\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Steven Wilzbach\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: August 6, 1999 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Eli Marienthal, Jennifer Aniston, Christopher McDonald, Harry Connick Jr., Vin Diesel, John Mahoney, M. Emmet Walsh, James Gammon, Cloris Leachman.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $23.1M (US)\/$31.3M (World)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: *** \u00bd<\/p>\n

\u00a0Although The Iron Giant<\/strong> employs traditional 2D animation, it would unfair and inaccurate to characterize it as a \u201ccartoon\u201d. That implies it\u2019s for kids and while they will certainly like it, adults will appreciate it more. Grade schoolers aren\u2019t likely to know anything about the Cold War era, the period in which The Iron Giant<\/strong> is set (1957 to be exact), a time when alien invasion movies were really metaphors for the imminent Communist invasion feared by many Americans. They won\u2019t understand the references to Sputnik, fallout shelters, beatniks and the \u201cduck-and-cover\u201d films shown to school children at the time. For them, The Iron Giant<\/strong> will be just as much a history lesson as a sweet and funny animated movie about a boy and a fifty-foot robot from space. In a way, it\u2019s a lot like E.T. Directed by Brad Bird (The Incredibles), it\u2019s a beautifully rendered movie that has deservedly become a cult classic since its initial release in \u201999.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It all starts when the titular being crash lands into the ocean just outside the small coastal town of Rockwell, Maine. He\u2019s found in the forest one night by 9YO Hogarth Hughes (Marienthal, American Pie) who saves him from being electrocuted while eating the power station. He tries to tell his widowed mother Annie (Aniston, Friends) about his amazing discovery, but she doesn\u2019t believe him. The next day, Hogarth returns to the scene to get photographic evidence of the robot\u2019s existence. The two end up becoming friends with the Iron Giant (Diesel, the Fast & Furious movies) following Hogarth home. In the meantime, a government agent named Kent Mansley (McDonald, Happy Gilmore) arrives in town to investigate reports of a giant robot that eats metal. Wouldn\u2019t you know he rents a room in the Hughes household in order to pump Hogarth for information?<\/p>\n

\u00a0The boy hides his new friend at a junkyard belonging to beatnik artist Dean (singer Connick), but to no avail. Mansley calls in the Army, led by General Shannon (Mahoney, Frasier), to neutralize the perceived threat. The thing about the Iron Giant is that he\u2019s a peaceful being. Like E.T., he\u2019s like a child lost in a world he doesn\u2019t understand. He\u2019s peaceful until he perceives a threat, then he turns into a weapon capable of defending himself with deadly force. So naturally he\u2019s going to fight back when the Army comes at him with guns and tanks. But since Hogarth taught him the merits of being like Superman, it\u2019s a no-brainer that he will do something heroic that ultimately saves the whole town.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The Iron Giant<\/strong> bombed at theaters in summer \u201999, mainly due to poor marketing. The suits at Warner didn\u2019t expect much from it, especially after Quest for Camelot tanked the previous year. They didn\u2019t promote it properly and even though test audiences responded enthusiastically, it just didn\u2019t bring in the kind of numbers it needed to make it a hit. At a cost of $80 million, it didn\u2019t even break even. I had a feeling that would happen and not just because of the studio\u2019s faulty marketing strategy (or lack thereof). The Iron Giant<\/strong> has this retro thing going for it that kids wouldn\u2019t respond to. It doesn\u2019t pander to audiences, but rather engages their collective imagination. Show of hands, how many of you dreamed of having a giant robot as a friend when you were a kid? Okay, that\u2019s nearly everybody. The Iron Giant<\/strong> fills you with the same sense of wonder that you felt when seeing Star Wars, Raiders of the Lost Ark or E.T. for the first time.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The style of animation helps maintain the retro feel. The makers used computers in order to allow the Iron Giant to move more fluidly, but you can hardly tell. The rest of The Iron Giant<\/strong> is the hand-drawn animation many of us grew up watching. It allows us to focus more on the emotional aspects of the story. This movie has plenty of heart. In one scene, Hogarth explains death to the Iron Giant after they witness hunters shooting a deer. The friendship that develops between the two is touching and not unlike the one between Elliott and E.T. Hogarth is a lonely boy picked on by his peers for being smart. His mother, a waitress at the local diner, works long hours. He\u2019s also an only child. He understands how lonely the Iron Giant must feel. That The Iron Giant<\/strong> connects on an emotional level is an extra layer of greatness.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Artistically, it\u2019s awesome! The animation is great. The design evokes artists like Norman Rockwell (for whom the town is named) and N.C. Wyeth. It\u2019s colorful and lively. It may be 2D, but it\u2019s never flat. The score, composed by Michael Kamen and performed by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, perfectly befits the wondrous goings-on. In short, The Iron Giant<\/strong> is a great movie! It makes me feel like a kid again each time I watch it. It makes you believe anything\u2019s possible. If a movie accomplishes that, then it has done its job effectively.\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Iron Giant (1999)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Warner Bros.\/Sci-Fi-Action-Adventure\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 87 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG (fantasy action violence, language, some thematic material)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Brad Bird\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Tim McCanlies\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Michael Kamen\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Steven Wilzbach\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: August 6, 1999 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Eli Marienthal, Jennifer Aniston, Christopher McDonald, Harry Connick Jr., Vin Diesel, John Mahoney, M. Emmet Walsh, James Gammon, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5456,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-animation"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/The-Iron-Giant-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4016"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5457,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4016\/revisions\/5457"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}