The Mitchells vs. The Machines
This animated film is an absolute joy from start to finish. It’s suitable for the whole family to watch together, but it’s not just a ‘kids’ film either – it’s a laugh-out-loud, sci-fi adventure-comedy, with a fantastic voice cast and some of the most visually inventive animation of recent years. The balance between the surreal comedy and the heartfelt emotion is pitch perfect, and there’s really nothing not to love about the whole movie.
Premise: Non-technologically minded father Rick Mitchell (voiced by Danny McBride) is feeling increasingly disconnected from his aspiring filmmaker daughter Katie (voiced by Abbi Jacobson) as she prepares to go to film school, and so he suggests a final cross-country road-trip for some family bonding time, together with his young dinosaur-obsessed son Aaron (voiced by Mike Rianda) and his wife Linda (voiced by Maya Rudolph). However, a robot uprising that threatens to wipe out the entire human race complicates the family dynamics even further.
Review:
I remember seeing an earlier trailer for this film, back when it was still being marketed by Sony with the incredibly generic title Connected. I don’t remember thinking much of the film from that original trailer, which made it look like it was going to be a fairly kids-orientated movie about a technophobic dad whose children kept tricking him into kissing the family dog. I don’t remember being particularly impressed at all, so when, a year or so later, Sony sold the distribution rights to Netflix who renamed the film The Mitchells vs. The Machines (the filmmakers’ preferred title), it still wasn’t exactly high on my watch list.
What unfolded before my eyes when I saw the finished film was a joy to behold. The cold open immediately sets the tone and the scene, establishing that robots have now somehow taken over the world, and that the dysfunctional Mitchells may be the only free humans left. This simply scene, probably less than a minute long, not only sets up the sci-fi credentials of the movie’s plot, but also its visual style (complete with freezeframes and onscreen annotations) and its surreal sense of humour.
“…the father/daughter relationship really is the emotional core of the movie…”
The movie then flashes back to a few days prior, in order to establish the family and their internal dynamics. Danny McBride voices the father, Rick, but he’s not your typical “Danny-McBride-y” character – yes, he can be a bit loud and pig-headed at times, but it all so clearly comes from a place of love, and his frustration at struggling to connect emotionally with his soon-to-leave-home daughter is palpable and touching. His daughter Katie, who is voiced by Abbi Jacobson, is just as desperate to connect with her father before she goes to film school in a bid to find herself and “her people” – but she can’t understand why he’s determined to shoot down her dreams, and he thinks she needs to prepare herself for the inevitable disappointment that’s part of an artist’s life.
For all its sci-fi nuttiness (and there is plenty of that to come), the father/daughter relationship between Rick and Katie really is the emotional core of the movie – and make no mistake, this is a film that can effortlessly pivot from laugh-out-loud funny to something-in-your-eye emotional within the same scene. And although Rick and Katie are the emotional core of the film, the other family members still get plenty of great moments, whether it’s Aaron (voiced by co-writer/director Mike Rianda) obsessing over dinosaurs, or Linda (voiced by Maya Rudolph) struggling to play matchmaker between Rick and Katie while also trying to keep up with the Instagram-perfect family next door, the Poseys (voiced by Chrissy Teigen and John Legend). Every member of the Mitchell family gets at least one (if not more) great laugh-out-loud moment – and I include their weird dog Monchi in that statement
“…it’s all tied together by the film’s sense of humour…”
Visually, The Mitchells vs. The Machines feels like it shares some DNA with Sony’s other recent animated masterpiece, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. I don’t mean that they look similar (as they both have very individual visual styles), but it’s more a case that neither of them look anything like any of the other mainstream animated films that the major studios are producing. The Mitchells vs. The Machines has quite a distinct animated style generally, but then in certain moments the audience effectively get to see the world through Katie’s eyes, complete with superimposed cartoon doodles and annotations, which elevates the animation to a whole other level.
Story wise, the film doesn’t disappoint and its plot balances the comedic and dramatic requirements of the movie perfectly. The action sequences are engaging, the adventure elements are engrossing, and it’s all tied together by the film’s sense of humour. I really don’t want to give anything away for those who haven’t seen any trailers or spoilers, but Oscar-winner Olivia Colman is hilarious in her role as the villain behind the robot uprising, Eric André does a lot with a little in his role as a self-unaware tech-billionaire, and Fred Armisen and Beck Bennett steal scenes as two of the robots that the Mitchells encounter.
“…it’s rare to see a film that is firing on all cylinders as well as this one…”
It’s also refreshing and heartening to see a family-oriented film like this feature an openly LGBTQ character as its protagonist, but deal with it in a matter-of-fact way so that it’s just a part of their personality, rather than it being a character’s defining feature or the source of conflict with others. With so many mainstream films either addressing LGBTQ representation in a heavy-handed way, or doing no more than playing superficial lip-service to representation (like the infamous same-sex kiss between two background characters in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker), it’s encouraging to see representation handled so deftly and sensitively here.
In truth, it’s rare to see a film that is firing on all cylinders as well as this one, but The Mitchells vs. The Machines really does have it all – the action sequences are top notch, the sci-fi adventure story is fantastic, barely a minute goes by without some hilarious comedic moment, and then to cap it all off, the final act is packed full of punch-the-air moments, laugh-out-loud gags, and cathartic emotional climaxes. All in all, it’s a film that the whole family can all watch together, but it’s one that’s also well worth watching without kids if you’re just looking for a feel-good adventure comedy.
