Not the Best Pixar ever - but great anyway

Rating: 8/10 (5 November 2004)

One thing I will hand to Pixar, they are acknowledging their adult fan base. Adult oriented animation is growing mainstream. This animation feels more like a regular film in that respect. We now take for granted the spectacular animation, so we pay attention to the story and characters. The story is not the most original - some have brought up the similarity to "Spy Kids" and I will concur. The very thing you will notice is much less humour. Once again this is not a bad thing, because we are given a more fleshed out relationship between the father and mother. Also, one of the kids definitely is a rebel, a nice touch to show that there no longer is such a thing as a nuclear family in this day and age.
The film tries to unshackle the world of make believe as you watch this film, though only so far. With heavy music cues and 60's era production design, we are left no doubt that the audience is supposed to be thinking "James Bond" as we watch our hero's venture on to the villain's island base of operations. But there is one cool difference with this film. In many recent live-action adventure films, there would be a point where it was obvious that we were no longer looking at live actors, but pure CGI. The complaint rising out of this was "I can just stay home and play a video game". In "The Incredibles", we know this all pure CGI, so we don't need to lodge that complaint. Also, Pixar shows that our heroes are sometimes fallible.
Now to the technical side of things. I liked "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow" purely because of it's loving depiction of the cool look of the era. In this case, all the cool things from the early 60's are lovingly rendered in this film, from cars with lots of chrome, to traditional "Metropolis" skylines, to the jazzed up mega-stylish sets from the old Bond films. Indeed, it seems that Pixar polled their animators to see what their dream animation pieces would be, and they are all lovingly displayed neatly into the storyline. There is the "Doc Ock" machine, giving it realistic destructive capabilities. Then is the completely left field character who designed the superhero costumes. Her house is all things art-deco. There are comic book moments, car chases, tremendous point-of-view action shots, realistic lava, a fantastic waterfall, and on and on.
I do not know the budget for this film, but there are many many setups, all with greatest 3D animation so far ever scene (until "Cars" comes out next year). Some looking far more realistic than the previously mentioned CGI shots from other live-action films. The shirt and coat the main character wears is far more realistic than the CGI coat worn by CGI Keanu Reeves in "Matrix Reloaded". Water, hair, and fire effects are similarly realistic.
The only complaints? We see too little of Samuel Jackson's character, and we don't get too concerned about the peril our heroes get in, because we know they will survive to get our prerequisite happy ending. But then again, everyone knows that this will spawn a sequel, so who cares?
I give this a 7 out of 10.
Added 6/13/08: Alas no sequel is in the cards, it shows how much work went into the success of the original project. This film still remains one of my favourites.