DAN WEBSTER:
Loss, as we all come to realize sooner or later, is an unavoidable part of life. And that’s true no matter whether we’re talking about the death of a loved one or something as simple as watching children leave home and head out to face the world on their own.
This basic truth poses, of course, a kind of conflict, one that is closely linked to the connections that make such losses so profound even while they are as natural to life as existence itself.
That conflict, those connections and the emotions they evoke sit at the heart of the animated film Robot Dreams, which is playing at the Magic Lantern Theatre—and will be available to stream soon on Apple TV+.
Directed by the Spanish filmmaker Pablo Berger and adapted from Sarah Varon’s 2007 graphic novel—the two hold co-screenwriting credits—Robot Dreams was a 2024 Best Animated Oscar nominee (it lost out to Hayao Miyazaki’s The Boy and the Heron). And while the animation, which has all the charm and simplicity of a children’s book, can’t compete with Miyazaki’s visual artistry, what Berger puts on the screen is a testament to how well a cartoon-like creation can capture complex emotions.
What Berger and Varon give us is Dog, a character who lives like a human in a Manhattan apartment, on a street filled with animal characters—all of different species and all representing the range of humanity that likely exists in real life on any given New York City neighborhood block.
Dog lives a simple life, one that involves habitually playing video games (a favorite being Pong, which helps set the film’s time frame firmly in the 1980s). He eats the same microwave macaroni-and-cheese meals every night, and soon enough it becomes clear that Dog is lonely.
Life changes when an ad appears on television for a build-it-yourself robot. Dog orders the kit, and soon a companion takes shape—it being a robot, classic in all ways, from its barrel-like metal body, elongated arms and a head bearing a flexible mouth and large expressive eyes.
That mouth, by the way, has multiples uses, though the only sounds that are emitted from it are whistles. In fact, Robot Dreams—which runs a full hour and 43 minutes—has no dialogue at all. The only words that Berger uses come from such foot-tapping tunes as “September” by Earth, Wind & Fire and “Happy” by William Bell.
But Berger makes it work, animating Varon’s images in a way that gives us insight into how each character feels. Dog finds joy in having a companion, Robot finds joy in discovering—as a new-born would—the wonders of everyday life. And they find joy in each other.
Everything changes, though, when one day the two of them head to the beach… a foreshadowing since we know how much a threat water is to mechanical contraptions. And sure enough, while the day starts off well, trouble ensues. So begins a long stretch when, for a variety of reasons, Dog and Robot are separated. We watch as each is forced to cope with the situation, with Robot encountering threats along the way and Dog repeatedly being frustrated.
And then there are the dreams, which both have and which Berger plays out in ways that we are at first led to believe are true—but ultimately are only exercises in ever-hopeful wish-fulfillment.
To explain more would surely spoil the charm of what Berger and Varon have teamed up to tell us. Suffice it to say that “Robot Dreams,” in the hands of a skilled filmmaker such as Berger, is a bittersweet tale that manages to capture well the themes of the basic need for connection and the pangs of loss that ultimately, invariably, ensue.
Great literature has always pursued such themes. The renowned Spanish playwright Calderón de la Barca wrote (and pardon my college-Spanish translation) “Life is a dream... and dreams themselves are dreams.” Composers have done much the same. When it comes to Robot Dreams, Stephen Stills may well have best captured the film’s meaning. “If you can’t be with the one you love,” he sang, “Love the one you’re with.”
For Spokane Public Radio, I’m Dan Webster.
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Movies 101 host Dan Webster is the senior film critic for Spokane Public Radio and a blogger for Spokesman.com.