The Iron Giant (1999)

A young boy befriends a giant robot from outer space that a paranoid government agent wants to destroy.

Director:

Brad Bird

Writers:

Tim McCanlies (screenplay by), Brad Bird (screen story by)

Stars:

Eli Marienthal, Harry Connick Jr., Jennifer Aniston

20 wins & 18 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Jennifer Aniston	...	Annie Hughes (voice)
Harry Connick Jr.	...	Dean McCoppin (voice)
Vin Diesel	...	The Iron Giant (voice)
James Gammon	...	Foreman Marv Loach / Floyd Turbeaux (voice)
Cloris Leachman	...	Mrs. Tensedge (voice)
Christopher McDonald	...	Kent Mansley (voice)
John Mahoney	...	General Rogard (voice)
Eli Marienthal	...	Hogarth Hughes (voice)
M. Emmet Walsh	...	Earl Stutz (voice)
Jack Angel	...	Additional Voices (voice)
Bob Bergen	...	Additional Voices (as Robert Bergen)
Mary Kay Bergman	...	Additional Voices (voice)
Michael Bird	...	Additional Voices (voice)
Devon Cole Borisoff	...	Additional Voices (voice) (as Devon Borisoff)
Rodger Bumpass	...	Additional Voices (voice)

Storyline

This is the story of a nine-year-old boy named Hogarth Hughes who makes friends with an innocent alien giant robot that came from outer space. Meanwhile, a paranoid U.S. Government agent named Kent Mansley arrives in town, determined to destroy the giant at all costs. It's up to Hogarth to protect him by keeping him at Dean McCoppin's place in the junkyard.

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Plot Keywords:

cult film | robot | government agent | friend | friendship | 

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Taglines:

It came from outer space!

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Genres:

Animation | Action | Adventure | Comedy | Drama | Family | Sci-Fi

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG for fantasy action violence, language, some thematic material and smoking

Did You Know?

Trivia

The sequence of shots where the Giant is revealed took nearly a year to complete from concept to full execution. The sequence incorporates many different elements and perspective changes, as Brad Bird points out. It was Steve Markowski's idea to have the Giant revealed in the background while standing in darkness and having the lights of his eyes turn towards our view.

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Goofs

At the beginning of the film, Sputnik is shown orbiting from East to West. All non-polar orbits of satellites run West to East, in order to take advantage of the Earth's rotation.

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Quotes

Hogarth Hughes: I know you feel bad about the deer, but it's not your fault. Things die. That's part of life. It's bad to kill, but it's not bad to die.
The Iron Giant: You die?
Hogarth Hughes: Well, yes, someday.
The Iron Giant: I die?
Hogarth Hughes: I don't know. You're made of metal, but you have feelings, and you think about things, and that means you have a soul. And souls don't die.
The Iron Giant: Soul?
Hogarth Hughes: Mom says it's something inside of all good things, and that it goes on forever and ever.
[Hogarth leaves. The Iron Giant lays back to look at the stars]
The Iron Giant: Souls don't die.

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Crazy Credits

The Warner Brothers logo is done in 50's art deco, as the Sputnik signal is heard.

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Alternate Versions

The Signature Edition adds two new scenes that were storyboarded for the original film, but were never fully animated. In the first, Dean and Annie have a conversation at the diner right before the farmer sells dean the tractor with the bite taken out of it. In the second, the Iron Giant has a dream in which armies of Giants take over and destroy a world.

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Connections

References Whose Line Is It Anyway? (1998)

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Soundtracks

Searchin'
Written by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller
Performed by The Coasters
Courtesy of Atco Records
By Arrangement with Warner Special Products

User Reviews

A delightful surprise

"The Iron Giant" is the kind of animated film you wish there was more of. It respects the audience's intelligence, it has genuine emotion without resorting to schmaltz, and best of all it balances fantasy (well, science fiction) with believability. I think Warner Brothers animation has out-Disneyed Disney by adding thoughtful writing to clean, understated animation. What a concept!

The story is deceptively simple: Iron Giant falls from the sky at the dawn of the Space Race and befriends a young boy. But within that framework we get a double story, one for the grown ups and one for the kids, but the message is essentially the same one: paranoia and violence begets violence. I appreciate very much, as others who have commented, that no one burst into incongruous song and that there were no cutesy animal sidekicks. I should add that there were no clever yet implausible plot twists, nor were there any stock characters. The bad guy gets a little overheated, true, but he is never the embodiment of all things evil. The townspeople are your average small town Americans, not bumpkins. Mom is, well, mom-ish, caring but neither shrewish nor prone to whimpering outbursts. And our hero is plucky but not annoyingly precocious.

A BIG plus for this film is how well it weds the computer animation to the hand-drawn animation, a feat that the Big Mouse hasn't mastered yet. Even as recently as "Tarzan" it is glaringly apparent what parts are computer graphics and which aren't, and the contrast is very distracting. "The Iron Giant" makes a virtue of streamlined animation that draws your eye to the beauty of its color and motion.

It was a very VERY distinct and unusual pleasure to be treated to a film such as this. Give us more . . . please!

Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

6 August 1999 (USA)

Also Known As:

The Iron Giant

Box Office

Budget:

$70,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$5,732,614, 8 August 1999

Gross USA:

$23,159,305

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$23,180,087

Company Credits

Production Co:

Warner Bros., Warner Bros. Animation, Warner Bros. Feature Animation

Technical Specs

Runtime:

86 min 90 min (Signature Edition)

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital DTS (Digital DTS Sound) SDDS DTS Dolby

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.39 : 1