The Iron Giant

Getting back to the films of 1999, I turn to a huge box office bomb of that year, The Iron Giant, which has gone on in home video to earn a much better reception. For some reason I had never seen it before, and found it to be a nice film with a good message for kids, but derivative of E.T., The Extraterrestrial and a forced Christian allegory.

Based on a novel by Ted Hughes, and coming out of a musical written by The Who's Pete Townshend, The Iron Giant was the directorial debut of Brad Bird, who went on to make The Incredibles and Ratatouille. It is set in 1957, the heart of the cold war, with students watching "duck and cover" films about how to survive an atomic blast. Hogarth (the film does ask, who would name a kid Hogarth?) is a boy who longs for a pet. Instead he finds a giant robot from outer space.

The relationship between the giant and the boy is reminiscent of many boy and his dog stories, but even closer to E.T. There are no Reese's Pieces, but the giant does eat metal, and Hogarth first wins him over by feeding him some, and then finding him a home in a scrapyard run by a beatnik. The government, in the form of a bumptious agent, seeks to destroy the giant, thinking he was sent by the Russians or something. Meantime, the giant learns that guns kill people (he and the boy watch hunters kill a deer) and then worries that he is just one huge gun himself.

The Iron Giant definitely carries an anti-gun message--the very notion that "guns kill" is antithetical to the NRA's position, so I imagine this film wouldn't make Wayne LaPierre happy. But it does go a little over the top in the Christian allegory department, with the appearance of a star-like light in the sky at the end (not to get into spoilers, but the giant does sacrifice himself for the good of humanity). The story is very simple, which makes it ideal for kids between 8-12, but adults may find themselves a bit restless.

The voice cast contains some big names, with Jennifer Aniston as Hogarth's mother and Harry Connick Jr. as the beatnik.