Atlantis: The Lost Empire

So while I was surprised the The Road to El Dorado was not a Disney film, I'm kind of surprised that this film is.

However, while The Road to El Dorado was just kind of one of those movies my parents bought to keep me entertained, I was overly excited for Atlantis: The Lost Empire because I was a victim of marketing. I wanted all the toys, I was sucked into this adventure film and I wanted to see it so badly.

I remember coming out of the film being oddly confused. I liked it, but there was just something strange about it that maybe didn't live up to the hype I had created for myself. my parents on the other hand, not wanting to make fun of the movie I had been raving about for months, but I could tell they didn't like this film. And from what I understand of the rest of the movie going audience, neither did they.

Atlantis: The Lost Empire follows the story of Milo Thatch (voiced by Michael J Fox), a janitor but also linguist specialising in dead languages as he trying to find an expedition to find the Lost City of Atlantis, however the Museum he works for thinks he's a joke.

Thatch is quickly recruited though by a friend of his grandfathers, Milo's idol and father-like figure, who gives Milo a book called the Shepard's Journal and the funds, all in the hopes of finding Atlantis.

I love Michael J Fox and I loved the combination of his voice and the animation for Thatch. The animation as a whole is something a lot different than anything Disney had ever done and that's partially the reason why I was surprised as a kid and even now that this is a Disney film.

Milo as a character, he's a doof. He's incredibly smart but he's nerdy and kind of socially awkward. This causes him to be a bit of an outcast, especially with the crew that his benefactor provides for him.

I think its these guys that really give the movie its feeling and heart. Each of these guys have a backstory and a motivation for going on this journey. While their backstories are all told as exposition and its kind of rushed, I still think there are some colorful characters in this story and they are actually a lot of fun.

So Milo is brought on to the expedition with the same crew that found the journal and they plunge into the deep of the Ocean to search for the city of Atlantis.

Honestly, I think this was the most appealing thing to me as a kid. The kind of Jule Vern's Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea combined with a sort of Indiana Jones type story was appealing to me back then, and its still appealing to me.

And by god...

All the machinery and subs in this movie are just a pleasure to watch, even now. The giant submarine still looks amazing to me.

I'm only bummed that this thing was destroyed so quickly into the movie. I know they couldn't spend the entire movie on this submarine, but damn that thing was cool, especially as a 9 year old. The Atlantian technology I thought was cool but not nearly as cool as these submarines. And I wanted to see more.

But as I said before, they're attacked by a giant lobster looking machine that oddly enough is never really explained or seen again, but they find an air pocket and begin a trek through the caves and underground to get to the city.

Then they get to the city, and things get weird... not bad, just weird.

They meet Kida and a civilization that still lives in Atlantis, something they were not expecting. Kida explains that the culture is struggling and they have lost a lot of their history and don't know how to fix things. Her father (oddly enough voiced by Leonard Nemoy) is stubborn and only allows the travelers to stay for the night.

And that's something I never realized about this film, once they get to the city, a lot happens in a very short time.

But its soon discovered that the people have forgotten their own history and they need Milo to help them discover it themselves.

And I'll be honest, even watching it now, I still don't think I totally understand all of the mythology and the mystical powers that surround Atlantis. Something about the crystals they have having a consciousness of its own and needing a host of the royal bloodline and, I don't know.

The short answer to all of this is that Milo goes to Atlantis because he believes there is a power source there that could help mankind. The Captain of the ship wanted to get this power source to sell it to the highest bidder and... well Kida kind of gets possessed by it.

I still to this day have no idea what was going on here.

But damn was the animation really beautiful and interesting to watch.

In short, the second half of this movie gets kind of confusing with all the native mysticism. Now I'm not saying they should have dumbed it down, but that really gets me into exactly who this movie was directed towards.

By 2001, Disney was well known for its Disney Princess, its colorful stories, and family friendly content.

But, like any business, wanted to branch off to get different demographics. Atlantis was suppose to be a movie with a little bit more of a darker and mature edge. While El Dorado did that with a lot of comedy and light heartedness along with it, Atlantis is very dark. People die. This movie was directed at a mature audience... but who?

Adults? Maybe? I don't know with the Disneyisms still in there and the overall cheese of the movie, its hard to sell this as a serious animated movies to most adults. Teenagers? I'm sorry, when I was a teenager and getting away from Disney movies and delving into more adult live action movies, the last thing I wanted was another animated film, no matter who violent or adult it was. It really wasn't until later that I started watching cartoons again and that was either Family Guy to make me laugh, or old Disney movies out of nostalgia.

So where does this movie fall?

Its kind of in that limbo that a couple of animated movies fell into around this time. Most namely, a movie called Titan AE.

I saw this movie once and I really don't remember it at all. But its kind of the same as Atlantis in that its not totally sure what audience its directing towards.

Sure the toys are great but the people who would play with these toys (and I knew people who had these toys, from both movies) were too young to really enjoy these films and honestly, really understand some of the things that are happening in the film.

And the older you get, the less likely the audience is going to be less interested in both action figures and animated movies in general so who is the audience?

That's really why Atlantis and Titan AE were both financial failures.

I can't say whether or not Titan AE was a bad film but I can say that Atlantis was not a horrible film. The animation actually is part of the reason this film (Atlantis) now has a cult following because its so unique and beautiful. The story is exciting though it gets confusing near the end. And the characters, though not totally developed, are fun and allow the watcher to have an adventure while watching.

The villain of this film, isn't that great. The mythology of this film, is kind of confusing. And the fact that this movie was produced by Disney kind of holds it back in many ways because as much as this film wanted to be something different and on face value it is, there's still a lot of Disney-isms in it that makes this movie just confusing for me now, as well as when I watched it when I was 9.

The sequel is on Netflix and I'm kind of interested to see it and see where they went with it... chances are they went down the road every animated sequel usually went down and I'm betting its really not good but hey, I got time and nothing to do. Might as well. We'll see.

But those are my thoughts on Atlantis: The Lost Empire. A film with somethings that are done pretty well, as well as a lot of confusing parts including the story and just the overall the feeling of the film. But what do you think? Do you remember this film? Was it apart of your childhood as it was mine? Let me know what you think. Comment and Discuss below. And Follow me on Twitter @cmhaugen24.