A SAFE SPACE FOR THE KIDS
New animated adventure a good way to introduce children to science fiction
If you’ve ever wanted to familiarize your child with the existential terror of being separated from humanity — think Tom Hanks in Cast Away or Robert Redford in All Is Lost — but without scarring
her or him for life, then this animated adventure from France may be just the ticket. Also known as Astro Kid, Planète inconnue and Unexplored Planet, Terra Willy opens with 10-yearold Willy (Landen Beattie) waking up on the highly automated
spaceship where he lives with his parents. They are intergalactic explorers, and he clearly aims to follow in their boot steps. Unfortunately, an asteroid strike sends parents and child hurtling in opposite directions in separate escape pods. Willy’s lands on an unknown world, and he has no idea how to get home again.
Maybe there’s nothing new under the alien sun, but Willy’s new home looks like a cross between the rougher patches of Avatar’s Pandora and some of the landscapes from No Man’s Sky. (I’ll admit I’ve spent more time than is healthy in both the cinematic and video game realms in question.) And the survival robot in his escape pod bears an uncanny resemblance to V.I.N. CENT., the bulbous ’bot (voiced by Roddy Mcdowall) from 1979’s The Black Hole.
The robot, whose name is
Buck, speaks in a male voice (Jason Canning) but has an interior voice that is female (Susan Myers), at least in the dubbed version being released in Canada. I had a lot of time to think about this apparent oddity, since not a whole lot happens to our pintsized protagonist over the film’s 89 minutes.
He encounters some mildly threatening alien beasties and a few really cute ones.
His new best friend acts like a friendly dog but resembles a dog’s chew toy.
Meanwhile, his robot does its best to keep him out of trouble, until it runs out of batteries and is forced to power down to await a rescue. Which will almost certainly happen, I’m guessing.
Terra Willy might just be the perfect film to introduce the very young to the movies, and especially to science fiction. The adventure is G-rated in every sense, and bored parents can bliss out at the beautiful background scenery.
Try not to nod off, though: In space, no one can hear you scream, but snores have a tendency to carry.