Brad Bird’s trademark as a filmmaker is movement. This might not seem unusual for a director of filmed entertainment, especially one who specializes in animation, but Bird’s movies really move, regardless of medium. The Incredibles zips along with such dexterity that it manages to pay full attention to a family of five, character management well outside the skill set of many decent superhero team movies. Ratatouille takes place largely in a kitchen but feels downright athletic and Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol found Bird making career-revitalizing sense of Tom Cruise’s indefatigable forward momentum (Doug Liman got some mojo back on Edge of Tomorrow in part by managing a pretty decent Bird impression).
Watching Tomorrrowland speed in circles, then, holds a sort of peculiar fascination. (The film opens today; Keith Uhlich reviewed in the current issue of The L.) Bird’s second live-action feature is too well-designed and, in parts, entertaining to be considered a total loss. But it spends a lot of time revving its engine: in a direct-address prologue featuring plucky sorta-teenager Casey Newton (Britt Robertson) and her reluctant mentor Frank Walker (George Clooney), leading into another prologue about Frank’s childhood, finally leading into the beginning of Casey’s story as she investigates the properties of a mysterious pin that seems to transport her to a retro-futuristic world whenever it touches her skin. It’s a neat effect, Robertson staying in place while her environment seamlessly cuts into (yes) Tomorrowland, the utopia we (and by “we” I mostly mean “baby boomers and a handful of less cynical Gen-Xers”) were promised by the ’64 World’s Fair, or the opening of Disneyland (where Tomorrowland has gone from futuristic to retro over the course of half a century), or whatever other mid-century pseudo-event of your (and by “your” I mean “baby boomers'”) choice. Tomorrowland, you learn (from either the movie or even the mostly secretive trailers) is a secret society in a parallel universe where the Earth’s best and brightest have convened to create that bright future—for everyone, though initially, Tomorrowland is invitation-only. And you know Bird knows he’d be invited.
