40 years from now, in 2075, extreme climate events will have forced humanity to live, at least partially, inside protective domes. Most jobs will have been outsourced to robots, everything from road work to the police. And even professions where the human touch was once thought essential, like teaching and childcare, will then be performed by humanoid machines. At least that’s how French director Ugo Bienvenu envisions it in his debut feature “Arco,” which is currently nominated for the best animated feature Oscar.
Despite such gloomy forecast, “Arco,” an incisive and wondrous sci-fi adventure about two children from two different periods, is ultimately hopeful about humankind’s prospects. Bienvenu’s hand-drawn characters appear halfway between the gritty realism one expects from mature graphic novels or comics and the cartoonish look of certain anime. The gorgeous, detailed backgrounds are one strong giveaway of Hayao Miyazaki’s marked influence on the French animator and illustrator. And that’s because both timelines in “Arco” unfold in environments were nature is prominent. That alone distinguishes Bienvenu’s take on a futuristic reality from most sci-fi narratives, which often occur in sleek, cold labs, desolate planets, or intricate spaceships floating in the vastness of space.
The version of Earth that 10-year-old Arco (Juliano Krue Valdi) lives in features homes on platforms raised on giant beams. Humans live above the clouds, and they have, seemingly, returned to a more minimalistic lifestyle after a catastrophe. Still, a young kid is a young kid no matter the era, and to fulfill his wish of seeing real dinosaurs, Arco disobeys his parents. He steals a rainbow-colored, flying cape that allows people to time travel and accidentally lands himself in the aforementioned, robot-driven year: 2075. Arnaud Toulon’s epic score propels “Arco” into Amblin movie territory, especially in scenes that soar across the sky.
There, Arco finds an inquisitive ally in Iris (Romy Fay), a girl his age, but with a different experience growing up. While Arco’s parents are physically present in his life, Iris only gets to interact with their holograms since they are away working. Caring for Iris and her infant brother Peter instead is a robot nanny named Mikki (whose voice combines Natalie Portman and Mark Ruffalo’s voices, since the actors also play Iris’ parents). From here, the film’s plot is simple. Arco must find the crystal he lost when crash landing in order for his colorful cape to work and travel back to his time. But an environmental disaster and a trio of quirky stooges (voiced by Will Ferrell, Flea, and Andy Samberg) will get in the way.
Curiosity for each other’s worlds dominates the relationship between Arco and Iris. She is surprised to learn that in his time, her future, robots like Mikki no longer exist, and he’s jealous that her parents are not around to discipline her. The exchange between these two futures yields a major revelation for the conclusion, but it also puts into perspective the artificiality of the present we are dangerously inching closer to. 2075 feels impersonal. Most adults around Iris’ town wear visors over their eyes, implying their bodies are there but their minds are elsewhere in a virtual setting. One sequence, as Arco, Iris, and the companions they pick up along the way break into her school, shows classrooms where holograms bring to life the past, including dinosaurs, but it’s all an illusion. And yet, Mikki’s fearless disposition to protect Iris at all costs seems to surpass what the robot was programmed to do. Even if that emotional connection is learned, it feels sincere.
Bienvenu takes children seriously, not only in that he explores their expectations and objections in their relationship to their parents and the rules they must follow, but because he doesn’t absolve them from the responsibility of their choices. Both kids in “Arco” learn that there are irrevocable consequences for putting themselves in danger. The price comes down to less time with loved ones that they can’t ever get back. The thematic maturity on display here or in the other Oscar-nominated French animated film, “Little Amélie or the Character of Rain,” is what most American studio films lacks. There’s no infantilizing of the intended young audience, but a conscious effort to address life’s difficult inflection points.
“Arco” looks at once fantastical and recognizable, removed just enough from what we know in our present, but grounded on familiar, childlike amazement. Bienvenu refuses to dwell on the mechanics of the time travel technology, the holograms, or protective domes. One gets to understand Iris’ era as events come to pass.. And though it’s clear this is a cautionary tale, Bienvenu offers the notion of a brighter tomorrow as a possibility, just as much as dark destruction is. There’s no denying that the planet is in a crisis, but what if this could be an opportunity for a rebirth? That’s a refreshing outlook one wants to believe in.
