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'Robots': Imaginative visuals rescue recycled plot

By ELEANOR RINGEL GILLESPIE
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Director Chris Wedge has thrown everything but the kitchen sink — wait, I think there is a kitchen sink — into "Robots," a clever, fast-moving animated feature brimming with metallic brio. Tiny wind-up toy pigeons peck at miniscule metal scraps on well-buffed sidewalks. The Tin Man is greeted by his limo driver at the airport. Even the cigars are brassy.

Blue Sky Studios

'Robots'

The verdict: Shiny execution rescues a rusty script.

Director: Chris Wedge
Starring: Voices by Ewan McGregor, Mel Brooks, Greg Kinnear
Run time: 90 minutes
Release date: March. 11, 2005
Rating: PG for some brief language and suggestive humor
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On the web
Official movie site
View the trailer
-- Trailers require Quicktime

The movie begins in homey Rivet Town, a kind of metallic Mayberry where the Copperbottoms are about to have a baby. In their living room sits a box containing bouncing baby boy parts and a manual, "How to Handle the First 50,000 Miles."

The baby grows up to be Rodney Copperbottom (Ewan McGregor), an idealistic inventor straight out of a Frank Capra movie. Brought up on the folksy encouragement dispensed by the avuncular and powerful Bigweld (Mel Brooks, channeling Wilford Brimley) on his TV show, Rodney heads to Bigweld's headquarters in Robot City, hoping to impress him with his new invention.

Unfortunately, Bigweld is nowhere to be seen and in his stead is Ratchet (Greg Kinnear), a sleek corporate weasel who hopes to make millions by ceasing to manufacture replacement parts. Which means the great scrap heap in the sky for outmoded models like Rodney's new pal, Fender (Robin Williams, channeling Robin Williams in "Aladdin") and his gang of junkyard misfits.

Ratchet's merchandising slogan, "Why be you when you can be new," is the antithesis of Bigweld and the movie's message: No matter what you're made of — old parts, new parts or spare parts — you can shine.

The recycled plot, unfortunately, is also a mix of old, new and spare parts; it's the least interesting thing in the movie. However, unlike Wedge's previous hit, the ponderous and predictable "Ice Age," his new film is nimble and imaginative.

Wedge and production designer William Joyce have created a visually inventive world of cogs and wheels and sprockets and widgets. A sling-shot bus ride across Robot City is a mix of Rube Goldberg, pinball and the old Mouse Trap game. And Ratchet's evil, scheming mother, who runs a formidable furnace underneath the city, looks like the ornery witch in "Spirited Away" and behaves like Angela Lansbury in "The Manchurian Candidate."

The movie loses steam in its last half hour. Or maybe we do; the frenetic pace can wear you down. But no need to yell "Danger, Will Robinson!" "Robots" is the sort of lively and heavily metal movie that C-3PO and R2-D2 would feel right at home in.