Every year, it seems obligatory that one of the Oscar-nominated animated feature films is preposterously bizarre and unsatisfying, having attracted attention solely because of the way it looks.
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| When Arco attempts to fly without benefit of his crucial time-traveling gemstone, Iris supplies the necessary weather conditions by blending the day's bright sunlight with water spray from sprinklers and her hose nozzle. The result ... leaves much to be desired. |
But there’s the not-inconsequential matter of story, in which department this feature from French co-directors Ugo Bienvenu and Gilles Cazaux comes up seriously short.
In interviews, Bienvenu has admitted constructing Arco from a series of hand-drawn sketches, rather than a script.
That’s blindingly obvious, because — in terms of narrative — this film often is an incomprehensible and impenetrable mess. Additionally, its tone veers wildly from serious ecological cautionary tale, to bumbling slapstick farce. Those two don’t play well together.
Bienvenu shares scripting credit — such as it is — with Félix de Givry.
In the distant future — sources differ on 2932 or 3000, but neither is mentioned during the film — people live on circular, open-air platforms that jut out, like branches, from immense towers. Those are anchored on Earth somewhere far below, beneath an all-encompassing blanket of concealing clouds.
Mention is made that this is “the great fallow,” intended to “let the Earth rest.” We assume some sort of ecological disaster, never specified.
Each family’s adult members periodically travel back in time, returning with single examples of a fruit, vegetable or spice, which are gene-sequenced and replicated, so that everybody can have lush gardens. Individuals traveling in this manner — which can take place only during a combination of rain and sunlight — leave a rainbow in their wake.
Animals never are mentioned, and (apparently) nobody has pets. But birds are in abundance, and people can talk to them (!).
The colorful animation style at times evokes Hayao Miyazaki, but his films always contain a cheerful warmth that’s utterly lacking in this cold, clinical, brooding story.
People sleep suspended in mid-air, under an anti-gravity light, in uniform-style pajamas and no blankets (which, frankly looks neither comfortable nor cozy).
Ten-year-old Arco Dorell (voiced by Juliano Krue Valdi) is too young to join his parents and older sister on such jaunts. He’s frustrated, wanting to see dinosaurs. So, one night he stealthily “borrows” his sister’s time-traveling cape and gemstone, gathers his courage, and steps off the edge of their platform. And falls, uncontrolled ... until he sorta-kinda gets the hang of how to maneuver.
Meanwhile, in the year 2075, we meet 10-year-old Iris (Romy Fay). She and her baby brother Peter are cared for by the compassionate family robot, Mikki (Mark Ruffalo and Natalie Portman), because their parents constantly work elsewhere. They nonetheless “visit” as often as possible, via ghostlike holographic images of themselves, which allow two-way interaction. It’s hardly the same, and Iris chafes at their absence.
Every home in the neighborhood can be enclosed by protective bubbles, during increasingly raging storms. Such extreme weather events have become more frequent; somebody mentions that the next firestorm could “wipe out everything.”
Iris and best friend Clifford (Wyatt Danieluk) attend the same school; on this particular day, she feigns not feeling well, in order to sneak outside to indulge her favorite pastime: sketching plants and animals. She spots an extremely erratic rainbow, follows it into the nearby forest, and arrives just in time to see Arco crash to earth, knocked unconscious.
She scoops him up, carries him home, and Mikki stitches the gash on Arco’s forehead.
The oddly dressed boy’s erratic rainbow also has been spotted by three conspiracy-minded brothers who once saw something similar, 20 years earlier, and have obsessed over finding it again. They’re named Dougie (Will Ferrell), Stewie (Andy Samberg) and Frankie (Flea), but they may as well be called Larry, Moe and Curly. They’re buffoons; they constantly bicker, drop things, fall over furniture and each other, and bring this film to a clumsy, stuttering halt every time they appear.
Alas, Arco and Iris don’t immediately realize that the boy’s all-important gemstone was left behind, in the woods ... and the Three Stooges find it.
At this point, the story settles for a bit, as Arco and Iris get to know each other. The world of 2075 contains nifty stuff: the wise, companionable Mikki; the bubble-like scooters kids use for travel; and the way local infrastructure is maintained — and classrooms taught — entirely by robots.
But then we hit the third act, laden with all manner of catastrophe, peril and an eyebrow-lifting “conclusion” that’s unforgivably sad in half a dozen different directions. All of this is followed by a fleeting epilogue that suggests Iris will grow up to become the architect who designs and proposes the far-flung future structures in which people live ... leaving us with the bleak realization that Earth must endure almost a millennium of ecological devastation before getting there.
Seriously?
Given all that, and despite the film’s PG rating, parents should think twice before allowing small children to watch it.
Although numerous U.S. film festival screenings qualified Arco for Academy Award consideration, it wasn’t released widely here until February 24, via on-demand video. As an additional annoying touch, it’s available solely via its English-dubbed cast, rather than the original French with English subtitles.
I cannot imagine how anybody can be satisfied with this mess, despite the visual creativity involved.
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