The Mitchells vs. The Machines - 2021
Rating - PG
Directed and written by - Mike Rianda and Jeff Rowe
Starring - Abbi Jacobson, Danny McBride, Maya Rudolph, Mike Rianda
Run time - 114 mins
The Mitchells vs. The Machines is a 2021 animated sci-fi adventure comedy film, written and directed by Mike Rianda and Jeff Lowe. The main protagonist is outcast teenager Katie Mitchell (voiced by Abbi Jacobson), who has made films all her life, usually featuring her brother or dog. She lives with her dysfunctional family - her outdoorsy dad Rick (Danny McBride), her supportive mum (Maya Rudolph), her dinosaur-obsessed little brother Aaron (Mike Rianda) and the family pug, Monchi (Doug the Pug).
Katie is super excited when she is accepted into a film school in California. The relationship between Katie and her dad, Rick, is strained; so in an attempt to save it, he takes the family on a road trip to her college from their home in Michigan to California. Shortly into their trip, the phone company PAL’s artificial intelligence (Olivia Colman) turns on her creator, the company's CEO Mark Bowman (Eric André) and uses his newly invented robots to capture all the humans and take over the world. When the Mitchells are presumably the only non-captured people in the world, it is up to them to try clumsily to save humanity from the robot apocalypse.
The supporting cast includes Fred Armisen, Beck Bennett, John Legend, Chrissy Teigan, Charlyne Yi and Conan O’Brien.
The film is produced by the producers behind the Oscar-winning 2018 animated movie Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. A sequel to it, - Across the Spider-Verse: Part One - is set for release later this year. Similarly to Into the Spider-Verse, The Mitchells vs. The Machines is nominated for Best Animated Feature at the 2022 Oscars - set to take place in late March.
Mike Rianda, the film's co-writer and director - best known previously for his voice work on Gravity Falls, created the story for the film that laced real-life accounts about his family and his childhood infatuation with robots.
This film is so much fun for all ages. The animation style takes some inspiration from Into The Spider-Verse, making it vibrant, eye-catching, and revolutionary. It is so hilarious and has a heart-warming story in the middle of a beautifully surreal journey shown in the movie. The character of Katie is highly relatable for me (another film-obsessed teen) and her character has been sighted by critics as being groundbreaking for representation of the LGBT community in movies. All of the main characters are funny and delightful to watch, which is due to the excellent script by Rianda and Lowe and the terrific voice cast. The Mitchells vs. The Machines is an absolute hoot and is surely (one of) the best animated movies from 2021, maybe even from this decade.
Score - 9/10
The Mitchells vs. The Machines is available to stream on Netflix and to buy on DVD.
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