Astro Boy [Blu-ray]

Director: David Bowers

Overview

A young robot with incredible powers, super strength, and the purest spirit on the planet discovers the joys of being human while embarking on a worldwide journey to discover his true potential in this animated update of Osamu Tezuka's classic anime story. Astro Boy (Freddie Highmore) is a young robot from futuristic Metro City. Created by a brilliant scientist named Tenma (Nicolas Cage), and powered by pure positive "blue" energy that gives him such abilities as x-ray vision, inhuman speed, and flight, the wide-eyed android longs to find his true place in the world. He sets out on an epic journey that brings him face to face with an underworld army of robots and some of the strangest creatures ever to walk the Earth, and along the way learns to experience human feelings and emotions. Astro Boy's remarkable mission of discovery is suddenly cut short, however, when he learns that his friends and family back in Metro City are in grave danger. As Astro Boy prepares to face off against his greatest adversary in order to save everything he cares most about, he realizes that only through victory will he finally discover what it takes to be a hero.

Product Details

Release Date:	03/16/2010
UPC:	0025192058493
Original Release:	2009
Rating:	PG
Source:	Summit Entertainment
Region Code:	A
Presentation:	[Wide Screen]
Sound:	[Dolby Digital Stereo, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround]
Language:	English
Time:	1:34:00
Sales rank:	26,337

Special Features

Two all-new animated sequences: astro vs the junkyard pirates; Inside the recording booth; Designing a hero; Building metro city; The rrf in: the new recruit; Astro Boy image gallery: creating a global icon; Getting the Astro Boy look

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Freddie Highmore	Astro/Toby
Nicolas Cage	Dr. Tenma
Kristen Bell	Cora
Nathan Lane	Hamegg
Eugene Levy	Orrin
Matt Lucas	Sparx
Bill Nighy	Dr. Elefun/Robotsky
Donald Sutherland	President Stone
Charlize Theron	"Our Friends" Narrator
Ryan Stiles	Mr. Moustachio/Burning Robot
David Alan Grier	Mr. Squirt/Math Cowboy/Boxer Robot
Alan Tudyk	Mr. Squeegee/Scrapheap Head/Stinger Two
Newell Alexander	General Heckler
Bob Logan	Stinger One
Dee Bradley Baker	Trashcan
Moises Arias	Zane
Sterling Beaumon	Sludge
Madeline Carroll	Widget
David Bowers	Mike the Fridge,The Little Stinker
Elle Fanning	Grace
Samuel L. Jackson	Zog
Nicole Fletcher	"Oh No!" Kid
Maryann Garger	Dr. Pigknuckle/Newscaster
Tiffany Hillkurtz	Bride to Be
David Feiss	Cowboy Robot
Nicholas Guest	French Waiter Robot
Max Burkholder	Billy
Victor Bonavida	Sam
Steve Alterman	Press Secretary
Rif Hutton	Metro City Sergeant
Madeleine Russell	Metro City Girl
Pilar Flynn	Cora's Mom
Tony Matthews	Cora's Dad
Sterling Beaumont	Sludge
John Ottman	Composer

Technical Credits

David Bowers

Timothy Hyde Harris

David Bowers	Screenwriter
Timothy Hyde Harris	Screenwriter
Maryann Garger	Producer
Cecil Kramer	Executive Producer
Ken Tsumura	Executive Producer
Paul Wang	Executive Producer
Francis Kao	Executive Producer
Linda Lamontagne	Casting
Jim Bolt	Sound Mixer
Elliot Tyson	Sound Mixer

Editorial Reviews

The plot of Astro Boy might sound a little dark for a kid's movie -- it's got death, robots, and implied class warfare -- but somehow, the end result is a rollicking good time. That kind of makes sense when you remember that this film is based on an anime. And in that peculiar way that Japanese animation has cornered the market on mixing seriously grave themes with super-dazzling cuteness, Astro Boy manages to glide past the implications of its own sometimes grim material and wow you with its wild action sequences alone. The movie's also got heart -- or at least a glowing blue core of volatile, concentrated energy. But despite what sounds like an insanely heavy backstory, the movie doesn't strive for the kind of heartbreaking poignancy and emotional gravity of Pixar fare. The premise is that in the distant future, society has relocated to a floating metropolis called Metro City -- or, rather, the upper crust of society has. The poor are stuck on the earth's surface (along with the world's misfits, runaways, and other outsiders), where the Metropolites dump their junk. It also happens that people have come to rely completely on robots to do all the dangerous, menial, or otherwise crappy work in their hovering utopia. Thus, we're introduced to Toby (Freddie Highmore), the spunky and brilliant young son of an important research scientist in the field of robotics, Dr. Tenma (Nicolas Cage). Tenma is demonstrating an über-powerful new energy source called Blue Energy for an evil military bigwig named General Stone (Donald Sutherland) when Toby's insatiable curiosity lands him in the middle of an experiment gone wrong. The kid is killed in the accident (which we don't actually see), and his dad is devastated. So much so that he takes the Blue Energy nugget from the lab and uses it to create a super-powerful android version of his deceased son -- complete with all of the boy's memories, and jet rockets that can shoot out of his feet. But soon, Tenma realizes that the android can't replace his son and freaks out on his creation. The boy is forced to set out on his own, falling in with a ragtag group of orphans who live down on the surface, and discovering his own true self -- renaming himself Astro. Meanwhile, his new friends don't know he's a robot, General Stone wants to hunt him down and steal the orb illuminating his animatronic chest, and his dad is coming around to the idea he can love Astro as his own person. If that all sounds kind of gloomy, try thinking about the fact that in most sci-fi, when robots get treated this way, they rise up and cause the apocalypse. Even still, Astro Boy rarely feels scary, or even somber; in fact, sometimes the story feels downright standard. It's undeniably solid, though, and definitely a fun time -- no matter how humorless it sounds on paper.