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THE IRON GIANT

 ABOUT THE MOVIE

Genre: Animation
Starring: Vin Diesel, Jennifer Aniston, Harry Connick Jr, John Mahoney, James Gammon, Cloris Leachman, Eli Marienthal, Christopher McDonald
Director: Brad Bird
Rating: G
Year Made: 1999

 


 SPECIAL FEATURES

- Feature-length Commentary by Director Brad Bird, Head of Animation Tony Fucile, Story Department Head Jeff Lynch and Steven Markowski: Animation Supervisor for the Giant
- 8 Additional Scenes including an Alternative Opening and a Giant's Dream Sequence
- 13 Branching Minidocumentary Segments Highlighting Key Sequences from the Viewpoint of Score, Character Design, Storyboards and Animation
- Bird and Creative Consultant Teddy Newton Analyze the Movie's "Annie Meets Kent" and "Duck and Cover"
- "The Voice of The Giant" Featuring Brad Bird and Vin Diesel
- Stills Gallery
- Theatrical Trailers

 


 TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Language: English/Mandarin/Cantonese
Subtitles: English/Chinese/Bahasa
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1
Running Time: 1 hr 26 mins
Region Code: 3
Distributor: Alliance Entertainment



 

 

SYNOPSIS: 

An enormous robots has come from deepest space, crash-landed on Earth and followed eleven-year-old Hogarth Hughes home.

Now, young Hogarth has one big friend and an even bigger problem: How do you keep a secret that's 50 feet tall? Especially when a paranoid government agent is on the "alien invader's" trail, bringing with him the full might of the U.S. military to destroy the giant. It all adds up to a rousing adventure that's part metal, part magic and all heart.

MOVIE REVIEW:

The year was 1999. The CG heavy "Star Wars Episode One" and Walt Disney’s "Tarzan" were among the crop of high-profile summer blockbusters. Pixar’s third animated feature, "Toy Story 2" was released later in November. Somewhere in between, a little-known animation which featured traditional hand-drawn techniques makes its bow on the sliver screen.

That movie was "The Iron Giant".

Despite receiving accolades from the critics, the box-office was a disaster, barely causing a ripple in the vast ocean. Some blame it on Warner’s lackluster marketing campaign (it was their first animation foray after remaining dormant in the animation circle for years) while others on the emergence of computer animation.

Still, "The Iron Giant" deserved a larger group of audience. Directed by Brad Bird (The Incredibles, Ratatouille) and based on a children’s book, "The Iron Giant" tells the story of a gigantic robot which supposedly crash-landed in 1950’s America and befriend a little boy named Hogarth.

The movie on the whole hardly contains any slapstick sketches in fact some material such as a killing of a deer might be too harsh for the smaller kiddos. But what Bird brings to the story is his sincerity and genuine touches on the characters. The scheming government agent for example is Bird’s cheeky perspective of a screen villain. And there’s Dean, a junkyard artist who kept the Iron Giant on his backyard.

The voice cast includes Vin Diesel as the title character (before his immensely popular Fast & Furious stint), Jennifer Aniston as Hogarth’s mum and Harry Connick Jr as the weird but kind-heartened Dean.

As compared to Bird’s successful work such as "The Incredibles", "The Iron Giant" is more subtle and scores lesser on the 'pyrotechnics' as well. It’s like those early Disney animations but without the musical-and-dance numbers or cute talking animals to distract you. What it has is just a simple story about friendship with lots of heart.

The only CG component in the entire movie is "The Iron Giant" and with its release, it marks one of the last animation movies that employ hand-drawn techniques from Hollywood.

If you are a fan of Disney animations such as "The Lion King", "Tarzan" or even "Lilo and Stitch" you won’t find it hard not to love “The Iron Giant”.

SPECIAL FEATURES :

This special edition was released in 2004 in conjunction with Bird’s The Incredibles although a notch better than the original sparse version, you wish there were more indepth behind-the-scene featurettes besides those offered here:

Feature-length Commentary by Director Brad Bird, Head of Animation Tony Fucile, Story Department Head Jeff Lynch and Steven Markowski: Animation Supervisor for the Giant – Brad Bird and his animators are such engaging speakers and this commentary track certainly is one of the best on the subject of creating animations and information on the making of the movie.

8 Additional Scenes including an Alternative Opening and a Giant's Dream Sequence – With intros by Brad Bird, the additional scenes are mainly done in storyboarding, animatic forms, nevertheless deserved a look.

13 Branching Minidocumentary Segments Highlighting Key Sequences from the Viewpoint of Score, Character Design, Storyboards and Animation – Lots of short interviews conducted with the late Michael Kamen who was the composer, Joe Johnston (Jurassic Park 3) who serves as the designer for the Iron Giant, producer and other crew members.

Bird and Creative Consultant Teddy Newton Analyze the Movie's "Annie Meets Kent" and "Duck and Cover" – Touches on Teddy Newton who in real-life should posses a quirky sense of humour as he is the one who created the “Nuclear Bomb” educational short seen in the movie.

"The Voice of The Giant" Featuring Brad Bird and Vin Diesel – A short featurette showing Bird and Diesel doing the voiceovers.

A Stills Gallery and a Theatrical Trailer round up the extras of this Special Edition DVD.

AUDIO/VISUAL:

The strong Dolby Digital 5.1 enables the Iron Giant to roam earth with loud, thumping sound coming out from the surround and the visual transfer is excellent as well despite being a hand-drawn animation feature.

MOVIE RATING:



DVD RATING :

Review by Linus Tee

 
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