Well-meaning, partial success

Rating: 7/10 (24 April 2002)

We all like happy endings, but this one is an insult. It's so obviously a blight on an otherwise fine story that we can't even take pleasure in it. Why is it there?
I said it's a fine STORY; as far as the telling of it goes, something is lacking. I'm not sure animation was the right medium for it. It's fashionable to decry Disney's reliance on such things as fairytales, fantasy, anthropomorphic animals and musical numbers - but these, after all, are the kind of thing that can indisputably be done WELL with animation, and there's nothing wrong, surely, with making sure that form matches content. But animated science fiction like "The Iron Giant" never quite works. (No, not even when it's done by the Japanese.)
The giant itself is a masterpiece: the precise angles of every spring and hydraulic chamber have been calculated by a computer, then outlined so as to match the hand-drawn characters ... indeed, I get the feeling that the giant could not have been portrayed any other way, which, I'm afraid, means that the film was doomed, since when the humans are drawn and animated and characterised so as to match him, they don't have any life.
It's a noble, honest attempt (apart from the ending), pleasing to look at and certainly worth seeing. The extravagant praise heaped upon the film at the time of its release is probably due to the fact that it HAD just been released, and people hadn't had time to forget it. Surprisingly little time is required.