Review of Fantastic Planet (1973) by Brooks C — 19 Aug 2012

In the distant future, humankind-now called the Ohm-struggle to live on a primitive planet dominated by an alien race known as the Draag. After losing his mother to the aliens and being taken in by a Draag named Tiva, Terr adjusts to life as a pet under the roof of Tiva. Years go by, Terr becomes more mature, and begins to gain knowledge that is unbeknownst to the rest of the surviving Ohm. As Terr grows older, he escapes with a headset device that contains all of this knowledge and plans to distribute it to the surviving Ohm colonies. As this is done, the Draag plan to exterminate the Ohm and it becomes up to the humans to fight back.

Being based on a novel by Stefan Wul and one of the three feature films directed by Rene Laloux, Fantastic Planet (Le Planete Sauvage) is a surreal, imaginative, and fantastic movie that does animated films of its genre much justice. The story is mostly a political satire about social classes, class warfare, tyranny, and oppression. Most people may notice that it bears an uncanny resemblance to stories like Battlefield Earth and The Borrowers. Although, this book and movie came out before L. Ron Hubbard's Battlefield Earth, but the book was written in 1957. Making it five years after Mary Norton's The Borrowers (1952).

The imagery and animation style was produced in France and Czechoslovakia. It is gorgeous, innovative, and surreal. A lot of it reminds me of the Terry Gilliam animated segments in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Although, the style in which it is used does a superb job at creating a dark atmosphere for the story and conveying its symbolism. The attention to detail is very well done and the designs of the aliens are great.

Most of the story is told through narration and inter-monologue of the main character, Terr. The dialogue in the film is very well written and is one of those foreign animated films that is good either dubbed or subtitled. The voice acting in this film is very top notch. The characters all do a great job at conveying their personalities and give the viewer a sense of life.

The music is also very great. It consists of orchestrated piano music that is very memorable. It also does a lot in benefiting the surreal and dark tone that is presented in the movie.

Overall, Fantastic Planet is a superbly directed, animated, and written movie that is enough to please any fan of sci-fi/fantasy animation. This is a movie that I would recommend any fan of anime or Heavy Metal to watch. This is one of those Western animated films that people like me love, but just don't see enough of from the West. Laloux directed two other films like this one: Gandahar/ Light Years and Time Masters. Neither of which I've seen, but after having seen this movie I'll be looking forward to that time.