Astro Kid

{{Short description|2019 French computer-animated science-fiction film}}

{{Infobox film

| name = Astro Kid

| image = Terra_willy_planete_inconnue_ver2.jpg

| alt =

| caption = French theatrical release poster

| native_name = {{Infobox name module|fr|Terra Willy, planète inconnue}}

| director = Éric Tosti

| producer = Jean-François Tosti

| writer = {{ill|David Alaux|fr}}
Éric Tosti
Jean-François Tosti

| starring = {{plainlist|

{{Interlanguage link|Timothé Vom Dorp|fr}}
Édouard Baer
{{Interlanguage link|Barbara Tissier|fr}}
{{Interlanguage link|Marie-Eugénie Maréchal|fr}}
{{Interlanguage link|Guillaume Lebon|fr}}

}}

| music = Oliver Cussac[https://www.ladepeche.fr/article/2018/07/01/2828410-olivier-cussac-as-de-la-musique-de-film.html Toulouse. Olivier Cussac, as de la musique de film], 11 July 2018. ladepeche.fr. Retrieved 13 March 2021. (in French)

| cinematography =

| editing = Jean-Christian Tiassy
Hélène Blanchard

| production_companies = {{Interlanguage link|TAT Productions|fr}}
Master Films
France 3 Cinema
Logical Pictures
France Télévisions
OCS
Ciné+

| distributor = BAC Films

| released = {{Film date|2019|04|05|df=y}}

| runtime = 90 minutes[https://web.archive.org/web/20210511002153/https://www.bbfc.co.uk/release/astro-kid-film-qxnzzxq6vlgtoteyotaz Astro Kid] at the British Board of Film Classification. bbfc.co.uk. Retrieved 13 March 2021.

| country = France

| language = French

| budget =

| gross = $4.3 million[https://www.boxofficemojo.com/title/tt8329148/ Astro Kid] at Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 13 March 2021.

}}

Astro Kid ({{langx|fr|Terra Willy, planète inconnue}}, {{Literal translation|Terra Willy, unknown planet}}) is a 2019 French animated science-fiction film directed and written by Éric Tosti with the participation of the co-writers David Alaux and Jean-François Tosti. The plot concerns on a young boy named Willy, who after the destruction of his ship, gets separated from his parents and lands on an unexplored planet, where he must survive until the arrival of a rescue mission.{{Cite web |date=1 June 2018 |title="Terra Willy", le petit frère des "As de la jungle" en gestation à Toulouse |url=https://www.francetvinfo.fr/culture/cinema/terra-willy-le-petit-frere-des-as-de-la-jungle-en-gestation-a-toulouse_3334109.html |access-date=13 March 2021 |website=Franceinfo |language=fr-FR}}Felperin, Leslie (21 August 2019). [https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/aug/21/astro-kid-review-eric-tosti-family-animation "Astro Kid review – little boy lost on a planet far far away"]. The Guardian.

Synopsis

Following the destruction of their ship, a 10-year-old boy called Willy is separated from his parents with whom he traveled through space. His rescue capsule lands on a wild and unexplored planet. With the help of Buck, a survival robot, he will have to hold on until the arrival of a rescue mission. Meanwhile, they meet an eight legged lizard-like alien named Flash, with whom they become friends, and together they discover the planet, its fauna, its flora... but also its dangers.

Voice cast

= English Dub =

Landen Beattie as Willy
Jason Canning as Buck
Susan Myers as Probe
Laura Post as Willy's Mother
Keith Silverstein as Willy's Father

= French Dub =

{{Interlanguage link|Timothé Vom Dorp|fr}} as Willy
Édouard Baer as Buck
{{Interlanguage link|Barbara Tissier|fr}} as Probe
{{Interlanguage link|Marie-Eugénie Maréchal|fr}} as Willy's Mother
{{Interlanguage link|Guillaume Lebon|fr}} as Willy's Father

Production

Terra Willy is the second feature film from the Toulouse-based studio TAT Productions to be released in theatres,{{clarify|date=May 2022|reason=meaning?}} after The Jungle Bunch. Shortly after his previous film release in July 2017, TAT announced its production of Astro Kid with a team of 70 people and having a budget of €6 million.

The movie was animated using 3ds Max and rendered using VRay. Some of the render tests used Substance Designer on their own for textures. The team used 3ds Max pipeline because of the most common plugins like Ornatrix and Forest. The studio only had three developers for internal tools that were mostly used for plugging any holes in the usage design of the forest planet to use UDIMs for the first time. Substance Painter was used in a new way resulting in loading all the UDIMs and being able to bake all the maps in one place alongside UV and surfacing on ZBrush. These were later exported to Autodesk software alongside materials for the hard surfacing, for metals, paints, plastics, rubbers and for the background props modelling.

Reception

The film received generally positive reviews from critics,{{Cite web |last=Ivan-Zadeh |first=Larushka |date=23 August 2019 |title=Astro Kid review — lost in space with only a red robot to hear you scream |url=https://www.thetimes.com/business-money/technology/article/astro-kid-review-lost-in-space-with-only-a-red-robot-to-hear-you-scream-b0562zs8t |access-date=13 March 2021 |website=The Times |language=en}} and on Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of List of films with a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes from {{RT data|count}} reviews.{{Cite web |title=Terra Willy |url=https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/terra_willy |access-date=30 October 2021 |website=Rotten Tomatoes |publisher=Fandango}}

Tom Cassidy of Common Sense Media gave the film four stars out of five, saying "an animated alien adventure has learning, empathy, teamwork."{{cite web |last1=Cassidy |first1=Tom |title=Terra Willy Movie Review |url=https://www.commonsensemedia.org/movie-reviews/terra-willy |website=Common Sense Media |access-date=19 April 2024}} Leslie Felperin of The Guardian give a rate of the film three stars out of five, saying that the animation is "fluent and densely rendered, although sometimes the characters have less subtlety than their surrounding environment. But, compared with the relentlessly noisy animated features coming out of Hollywood, this is refreshingly old-school and innocent." He also noted that the film is "meant to teach kids about self-reliance, cooperation, the value of outdoor adventure and risk-taking; and the obligatory environmental sentimentalism is also present and correct." Larushka Ivan-Zadeh of The Times rated the film also three stars out of five, stating that the film has "a neat underlying message about how children, forcibly unplugged from technology and overprotective parents, will survive and thrive." She also said that the film's narrative has "heart-tugging boy-and-dog tale lacks in [it's] momentum, it makes up for in wondrous diversion." Starburst Magazine's Laura Griffiths rated the film six out of ten, writing that the film's animation is "wonderful and the environments which Director Éric Tosti and co. have created offer an exciting Technicolor landscape of weird and wonderful wildlife." Though, she also wrote that the voice acting is a "tad iffy," but overall, she concluded "a good story of survival with plenty of fun moments along the way."{{Cite web |last=Griffiths |first=Laura |title=ASTRO KID |url=https://www.starburstmagazine.com/reviews/astro-kid/ |access-date=14 September 2024 |website=Starburst Magazine}}

A year later, Sandra Hall of The Sydney Morning Herald gave the film a rate of 3½ stars, saying that "a film crafted expressly for small children, but it has subtleties."{{Cite web |last=Hall |first=Sandra |date=23 September 2020 |title=Astro Kid's space jaunt is an engaging journey |url=https://www.smh.com.au/culture/movies/astro-kid-s-space-jaunt-is-an-engaging-journey-20200923-p55yfx.html |access-date=14 September 2024 |website=The Sydney Morning Herald |language=en}}