'Tomorrowland' is sweet but mostly earthbound
I suppose we should be thankful that, for a change, a great big summer聽blockbuster has arrived that isn鈥檛 chockablock with comic-book聽superheroes or buzzcut, maxi-muscled marauders. 鈥淭omorrowland鈥� is a聽rather sweet excursion into speculative sci-fi, and, wonder of wonders, it聽doesn鈥檛 even seemed primed for a sequel. But this movie about the thrill聽of the visionary is, alas, mostly earthbound.
Directed and co-written (with Damon Lindelof and Jeff Jensen) by Brad聽Bird, who made the marvelous animated features 鈥淭he Iron Giant鈥� and 鈥淭he聽Incredibles,鈥� the film centers on Casey Newton (Britt Robertson), a聽precocious Texas teen whose dad (Tim McGraw) was once a NASA聽engineer at a rocket launch site. Now, to her horror, the site is being聽demolished.
Casey becomes the recipient of a mysterious pin with a big 鈥淭鈥� emblem,聽which briefly enables her to enter what appears to be a model city of the聽future, complete with model people. Back home in the present, she is soon aided by a benevolent聽pre-teen bot (Raffey Cassidy) and pursued by bot meanies, ending up paired聽with Frank Walker (George Clooney), an ornery hermit scientist who may聽hold the key to a return trip to Tomorrowland. This is assuming it exists at all and聽is not a wish-fulfillment fantasy.
Considering that Bird comes out of animation, the visuals in this movie聽are for the most part surprisingly prosaic (like something out of, maybe,聽鈥淪py Kids.鈥�) A vision of the resplendent (or not-so-resplendent) future聽ought to carry more oomph than this. Still, there are compensations: Robertson and Cassidy are spunky and Clooney is amusingly grizzled, and there鈥檚 a聽marvelous set piece where the middle of the Eiffel Tower suddenly turns into a great big rocket shooting into the night sky. The film鈥檚 eco-friendly聽concerns and general tone of messianic optimism are welcome.聽鈥淭omorrowland鈥� is really a civics lesson disguised as a summer escape聽flick. Grade:聽B- (Rated PG for sequences of sci-fi action violence and peril, thematic elements, and language.)
