A real nice proper kids film. Ice age 3, cars, wall-e etc they are all great films but they are really films for adults with their grown up sentiments, innuendo and clever "in" jokes. This is the first animated film I have seen in a while that is aimed squarely at kids. The whole story is told from Astroboy's naive innocent, idealistic point of view which, as he keeps getting knocked, lets the film have an emotional impact that the above mentioned films lack. The Astroboy character is flawlessly realised and I really appreciate that the CG animation does not compromise original visual concept by adding excessive detail or effects. The look is clean and simple like a high end hand drawn cartoon. The surround sound effects and LFE are top notch and there is a very catchy main theme. My kids love it, especially the girl 5 who keeps asking for it. (and also want to have rocket boots like Astroboy ,,,,,who doesn't!!!) I have sat through it twice now without complaint. (well actually first time round I thought that nick cage was a bad choice for voice acting because his voice is so distinctive that it is hard to associate it to anything else but nick cage's face. But second viewing I didn't have a problem with it at all so I think it was just a psychological thing.
anyway great film. I hope there is a sequel.