MEET THE ROBINSONS
© Walt Disney Home Entertainment
Mania Grade: B+
Rated: G
Cast: Adam West, Agela Bassett, Nicole Sullivan, Harland Williams, Tom Selleck
Writer: Stephen J. Anderson, Michelle Bochner
Director: Stephen J. Anderson
Distributor: Walt Disney Home Entertainment
Original Year of Release: 2007
Extras: Deleted Scenes, Featurette on inventions that change the world, Inventing the Robinsons documentary, music videos, family tree interactive game, Audio commentary with Director Stephen J. Anderson
Buy it now!
Rated: G
Cast: Adam West, Agela Bassett, Nicole Sullivan, Harland Williams, Tom Selleck
Writer: Stephen J. Anderson, Michelle Bochner
Director: Stephen J. Anderson
Distributor: Walt Disney Home Entertainment
Original Year of Release: 2007
Extras: Deleted Scenes, Featurette on inventions that change the world, Inventing the Robinsons documentary, music videos, family tree interactive game, Audio commentary with Director Stephen J. Anderson
Buy it now!
MEET THE ROBINSONS
By: Tim JansonReview Date: Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Meet the Robinson’s didn’t seem to generate the usual buzz that a Disney film does when it was release last Spring and I’ve been trying to put my finger on why. I’ve come up with a couple of possible reasons…First, the film’s plot was a bit more complex than the usual Disney film and its themes of time travel may have gone over the heads of younger children. Secondly, this was a decidedly “boy” movie. All of the main characters and most of the supporting characters were male and perhaps girls felt a bit on the outside. It’s too bad because I quite enjoyed the film. It was a fun, imaginative romp and intelligently written.
The story is based on a wonderful children’s book “A Day with Wilbur Robinson” written by William Joyce. As the film opens, a baby is left on the doorstep of an orphanage. Twelve years later, Lewis is an inventive genius but still has not been adopted. Fearing he’ll never find a couple who want him, he sets out to locate his birth mother. He builds a mind scanner which will take the image of his mother that he saw as an infant and project it onto a screen. However, someone tampers with the device with disastrous results at a school science fair. A boy named Wilbur Robinson tells Lewis that the sinister Bowler Hat Guy is behind the sabotage, and that Wilbur is actually from the future and needs Lewis’s help. Little did Lewis know that he actually invented a time machine that the Bowler Hat guy steals to alter the future.
Wilbur whisks Lewis off to his home, thirty years in the future. This future is a glitzy, sci-fi art deco, straight out of 1930’s pulp magazines. Lewis meets the Robinson family, a delightful group screwballs that includes Uncle Art (Adam West) an intergalactic hero who delivers pizzas; Grandpa Bud who runs around the house trying to find his dentures; Carl (Harlan Sanders) the nervous family robot, and Wilbur’s Mom, Franny (Nicole Sullivan) who teaches frogs to sing and play instruments in her spare time. Lewis and Wilbur will have to stop the Evil Bowler Hat Guy (complete with the villainous thin, handlebar mustache) before he can destroy their bright, promising future.
I laughed out loud several times during the film. The crooning frogs were like an amphibian Rat Pack and you didn’t want to cross those guys! Adam West’s voice just makes me crack up whenever I hear it because everything he says is in such a ridiculous dramatic inflection that you can’t help but laugh. The message of the film, valuable to both kids and adults, is to “Let it Go and just move forward”. In other words, don’t let life’s little failures get you down, move forward and keep trying. It also carries a very strong message of acceptance and family values as the Robinson’s are only to happy to adopt Lewis into their family, even if he is from a different time…but there turns out to be a VERY good reason why they can’t. Adults will enjoy the film, perhaps even more than a lot of kids as they will understand the time travel plotlines which will confuse younger viewers.
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