French studio Everybody On Deck and distributor GKIDS are bringing writer-director Jérémie Périn’s new sci-fi thriller Mars Express to the U.S. this weekend. The animated feature will release in both English dubbed and French with subtitles.
The Box Office Outlook
Mars Express’ $10 million budget and 88 minute runtime makes the financial math simple, and it’s already topped $1.2 million in France ahead of its North American release. I don’t expect a long box office run, but with a lower bar it means the film can play out in limited release without worrying about the inevitable and more lucrative revenue streams down the road.
It’s true that domestic mainstream audiences are generally less inclined to show up for animated films outside of family-oriented fare from the likes of Pixar, Dreamworks, Illumination, Disney, or Studio Ghibli. So it can be hard for original animated films like Mars Express to win over those audiences.
On the other hand, those films sport much bigger budgets and are expected to deliver nine-figure box office returns. Mars Express falls into the category of more artful and “indie” sensibilities, while delivering the sort of story and sci-fi action spectacle and visuals audiences like in live-action sci-fi films of the same nature.
Last year, GKIDS distributed Studio Ghibli’s The Boy and the Heron in North America, and that film went on to gross $47 million stateside. It also won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. GKIDS secured U.S. distribution rights for Studio Ghibli in 2011, and have had great success in that partnership.
Sci-fi is always popular, too, with Dune: Part Two the year’s biggest blockbuster so far at $705 million global receipts so far. Even the 1979 sci-fi horror classic Alien returned to theaters and made the top-10 last weekend. And Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is just 10 days away as part of the summer season kickoff.
Mars Express was nominated for Best Animated Film at the César Awards (France’s equivalent to the Academy Awards) and the Lumières Award (France’s equivalent to the Golden Globes), and won the Best Animated Film award at the Paris Film Critics Association. The widespread acclaim should carry over to North American audiences as well, where the genre and Mars Express’ particular themes are even more popular.
If reviews and word of mouth can spread far enough, then GKIDS should see enough attendance for Mars Express to make them happy and lead into successful PVOD and other home release options.
And word of mouth should be pretty good, because Mars Express is a visually exciting, smart, engaging detective story that will both impress with it’s animated quality and eventually make you forget your even watching animation.
The Full Review
From a story perspective, the film does tread familiar ground. The best comparison would be if Blade Runner was after the machines from I, Robot with the sensibilities and tonal pacing of The Creator, all rendered in bright colorful visuals that somehow successfully mix moody noir and disco pop. Throw in a dash of Westworld, and you get the idea.
But the familiarity doesn’t make it any less interesting or well written, and Périn’s done a wonderful job finding something new to say and do with the subject. He delivers a great deal of subtext in the characterizations, from off looks to throwaway responses that turn out to hold more meaning that we (or the other characters) realize. The desperate need to cling to a semblance of their lost humanity imbues certain cyborg-like characters with especially moving moments and arcs.
The voice acting for the English dub (I didn’t see the French language version, but am personally not at all averse to subtitles) is all very good, some great. The combination of the acting and the excellent hand-drawn animation gives the characters plenty of nuanced reactions and delivery, and sometime — the “cyborg” character Carlos Rivera is so well-realized in terms of acting, dialogue, animation, and his arc, his scenes and centered moments are most likely to make you forget you aren’t watching live-action performances.
The action isn’t overwhelming to the story in Mars Express, it has action but doesn’t rely on it to keep you entertained or in place of plot and emotion. When there’s action, though, it’s top notch and benefits greatly from the slow-burn and understated noir approach that helps subdue the portrayal of what in other hands could’ve become big, noisy moments where the mood and aesthetics get lost.
I love Mars Express’ animation. It reminds me of the comic art of David Mazzucchelli (specifically his DC work) or Alex Maleev, with a simplicity of line work that somehow creates a perfect impression of realism and movement without getting to complicated nor too cartoonish. The tech and how it’s presented is likewise both hyper-realistic and straightforward, it’s taken for granted within the story and characters don’t really draw attention to it or put a fine point on it.
With little new at the box office this weekend, sci-fi and animation fans would do well to check out Mars Express — and viewers who are waiting for something new, something different from the year’s current crop, and something that points the way toward high-quality animated filmmaking that’s impressive, expansive, and yet also keeps budgets low without sacrificing storytelling or eye-popping visuals.