Robot Revolution: The one where Kristin Stewart kills an alien with a piano

 

 

Title: Zathura aka Zathura: A Space Adventure

What Year?: 2005

Classification: Mashup/ Weird Sequel/ Anachronistic Outlier

Rating: That’s Good! (4/4)

 

With this review, I’m continuing my series/ feature on robots. An issue that has already come up is that while robots have figured regularly in science fiction films for about as long as the genre has existed, they have often been relegated to subordinate status, typically as servants/ minions to their good or evil creators. For the most part, I have used this to narrow down the field to the comparatively manageable number of films that make robots and other AI (which I have been planning to get to) truly central to the plot. For my fourth installment, however, I decided it was time to deal with an example of the “secondary” tradition, and that brought up a movie I have been looking for a chance to cover for a while. I present Zathura, a movie where the killer robot is the least strange thing about the film.

Our story begins with an introduction to a single dad and his two elementary-age sons, who habitually bicker while their teenage (step? half???) sister hovers at the periphery. When the father leaves on an urgent errand, the two kids try playing a Gernsback sci fi-themed game that’s really more like a mechanical toy. They discover that this is more than a board game, however, as perils like meteor showers and a malfunctioning robot become reality. The continuing misadventures leave the whole house adrift in space, threatened by a marauding reptilian race. Their best chance of returning home is a mysterious friendly astronaut who has played long enough to know the rules of the game- but the wrong choice may trap them in the game forever!

Zathura was a 2005 science fantasy film directed by Jon Favreau, based on the book of the same name by Chris Van Alsburg. The film was regarded as a thematic sequel to the 1995 film Jumanji, also based on a book by Van Alsburg. Favreau stated that the film was influenced by 1970s and 1980s films including Battle Beyond The Stars. The film starred Josh Hutcherson and Jonah Bobo as the brothers, with Dax Shepard of Idiocracy as the Astronaut and Tim Robbins as their father. Kristin Stewart appeared as the sister, and Frank Oz (see Dark Crystal, An American Werewolf In London) received credit as the voice of the Robot. Suits and practical effects for robot and aliens were created by Stan Winston Studios (see Invaders From Mars, Congo, etc, etc, etc.), as part of a blend of animatronic, miniature and CGI effects used for the film and often for the same sequences and characters. The film was a commercial disappointment despite favorable reviews, earning a $65 million box office roughly equal  to its budget. Its reputation has improved as both a “cult” SF/ fantasy film and family movie. The film is available for streaming on multiple platforms.

For my experiences, I really came to this film after seeing it mentioned by a reviewer I follow intermittently, as an example of a film I didn’t know was “supposed” to be a failure. That brings in certain further complaints that I have had with the likes of The Black Hole, The Blob and The Thing (see my video on the last): Yes, films that earn their budgets back can still lose a lot of money, but I have never cared for calling a movie a “bomb”, flop, etc. on that basis alone. With the present film, I can remember favorable reviews and a prompt viewing when it came out on home video. I was immediately impressed with it as a solid and creative genre film with the potential to turn into a “classic”, and from actual viewer feedback, I would say confidently that it has lived up to its potential. That, in itself, is exactly how films end up above my radar. For this feature, I finally felt I had a reason to comment on an excellent film.

Moving forward, all the obvious arguments, counter-arguments and counter-offensive arguments come down to the simple question of realistic expectations. Yes, there are things that can be off-putting for the adult viewer, especially the interminable bickering. But this is supposed to be a kids’ movie, and it can justify itself as portraying what kids deal with in real life through what becomes both a theme and a major element of the plot. The central science fictional elements are similarly framed as science fantasy in the vein of Starcrash and Flash Gordon, with a sounder suspension of disbelief than usual. It’s worth further note, with respect to my Anachronistic Outlier category, that this is all done with a fully modern visual vocabulary. To me, the one thing worth further argument is Stewart. On many levels, her character is one thing the film would have been as good or better without. I do feel that a major reason for the easily felt redundancy is that there is no confirmation of her exact relationship with the other family members. She does contribute as the actual “voice of reason”, and her completely justified reactions mitigate the question of whether the events on-screen are in any way “real”. Any further doubts are acquitted when she finally takes on an antagonist one on one, which (as alluded in the title) I am absolutely counting as an unambiguous combat kill.

Inevitably, I have to devote a section to the robot. I will point out, first, the technical facts: This is not a “practical” rig, as I recall a contemporary reviewer assuming, but a hybrid of a Winston suit with CGI effects that was itself an astonishing innovation. As for its on-screen appearance, there’s really just one sequence of the bot in action, which would have been the “one scene” by my usual format. It’s all set up with a fake-out scare involving a toy, which on consideration is perhaps the most clever hint that the movie’s “reality” is ambiguous. (I will get to that in a moment…) When the bot does appear, it is entirely and menacingly physical.  The ensuing mayhem quickly establish it as the most formidable of the movie’s antagonists. In the process, there are also established limitations. It’s fast, though not necessarily faster than the humans. On the other hand, it is seemingly clumsy, which might be in part because it is still figuring out which parts of the house it can simply tear through. The most disconcerting reveal comes when we see it repairing itself, establishing an ongoing threat that will be handled with another clever twist. When we get a look at its clockwork guts, it is ludicrously primitive, more like Tik Tok of Oz than a Golden Age bot. But then there is the bird-like self-repair appendage, which at certain points acts like a sentient entity all its own. There’s no direct answers to this and other questions; what works is that we don’t need them to enjoy the story.

Now for the “one scene”, I was as often happens most intrigued by an otherwise innocuous scene. Right around the first-act transition, the younger brother decides to cook some macaroni and cheese. The older brother says that there will be no running water while they are literally in space. Undeterred, the younger brother turns on the tap, and water comes out, filling the pan. When he goes to the stove, the elder brother reminds them that there “should” be no gas for the burners, either. (For that matter, the power should be long gone as well.) It’s no real surprise when the burner merrily turns on. It is a brief and minor moment, yet on analysis, it is the most mindboggling moment in a story that is already running on the willful suspension of disbelief. The simple and convenient explanation is that everything we are seeing is a product of the boys’ imaginations. The quite disconcerting alternative is that whatever rules and logic still apply in this assumed universe are a matter of what the kids would know and believe. It’s a hypothesis that could have been tested, if the older brother tried the same things himself, but the story is already moving on.

In closing, what I find myself coming back to is what makes a movie a “failure” in its own or any other time. As I have previously ranted, my own formula for actual disaster is whether a movie with a budget of at least seven figures can get half of it back, and dear Logos, I have covered enough that didn’t to prove that box office results are no measure of merit. There are ones now considered classics, like Return To Oz, though I have covered many more that didn’t actually do “that” badly. (Hell, Krull pulled through at about 60%.) There are ones that at least reached the level of “cult” fandom, like Deep Rising, and others that remain divisive even in those circles, like Memoirs Of An Invisible Man. Then there are the ones so mediocre and unmemorable that they don’t even live up to their own notoriety, like Adventures of Pluto Nash. What movies like Zathura prove is that there can be justice in the long and short term. In its own time, it did well enough just by earning as much as it cost. As it approaches 20 years from its release, it has endured the tests of time, above all as a film critics, fans and audiences still talk about.  It did what it set out to do, and by my regular refrain, that’s more than enough. Onward and upward…