An underrated animated gem from the late 90s

Rating: 9/10 (30 December 2013)

I fondly remember watching this when I was about 12 or 13 and like 'The Magic Sword: Quest for Camelot,' this is another animated film from my youth I had forgotten about for several years until the Nostalgia Critic reminded me of it by placing it at no. 6 in his 'Top 11 Underrated Classics,' which also included the likes of 'The Prince of Egypt' and 'Babe: Pig in the City' that I had also seen during my pre-teen years.
So back to 'The Iron Giant.' The animation was mostly smooth but jarring in places and there seemed to be a continuity error with regard to Hogarth's eyes - in some shots they had pupils in others they didn't. Other than the jarring movements and alleged continuities, the Iron Giant blended with the 2D animation perfectly since he didn't look anything like a CGI character and I liked the black and white animated segments that were used for the televisions and the bombing protection public information film shown at Hogarth's school. The film, although animated, had some realistic elements such as the Iron Giant eating metal that stayed true to the Iron Man eating metal in the Ted Hughes book and reminded me of a task I did at primary school where we were put into pairs and had to create a menu for the Iron Man that included ingredients such as chicken wire and oil. There were also some realistic and effective uses of colour and lighting such as the camera pan from a sunset sky to an autumnal landscape and the pale blue lighting as Hogarth followed the Iron Giant to an electric substation. The incidental music was initially forgettable but I found it fitting to the story when I re-visited the film this evening. As for the story itself, I found it a creative spin on the Hughes book that had a mixture of funny, somewhat crude and touching moments; the funny ones including the squirrel running rampage around the diner; the crude ones including Hogarth pretending to suffer from constipation as he tries to push the Iron Giant's hand out of the bathroom window and later sprinkling 'Coco-Lax' onto Kent's drink; and the touching ones including Hogarth's ever- increasing friendship with the Iron Giant and teaching him about death being a part of life upon witnessing a deer having been shot (it's Bambi all over again albeit less powerful. The story also has some educational value, especially Hogarth teaching the Iron Giant about the human world around him and that killing people or animals is a bad thing. Moving on to the voice acting, Jennifer Aniston as Hogarth's mother Annie and Vin Diesel, who pulled off the Iron Giant's voice as well as Robby Benson did with the Beast's voice in 'Beauty and the Beast,' were the standouts but Harry Connick Jr. as Dean and Eli Marienthal as Hogarth also did a great job with their roles. The ending of the missile destroying the Iron Giant, a statue of him being unveiled in the park and his separate parts moving in Iceland is unforgettable and moving without being too sentimental. I can even remember calling the film's setting Roswell instead of Rockwell as corrected by my then-babysitter and it was thoughtful of the film makers to dedicate this film to the memory of Ted Hughes during the closing credits.
To conclude, I originally gave this an 8/10 due to finding some scenes more memorable than others but I upgraded it to a 9 because I enjoyed watching this even more than I did when I was a pre-teen/teenager.