Hollywood’s vision of the future has been unmistakably bleak of late. Where franchises like Star Trek are consistent with their ideas of an eventual utopia, it’s going to take a lot of work — and time — to get to that point. It’s a dismal prophecy to those of us living through the 2020s, an era depicted thoroughly (and not too optimistically) across Star Trek’s history. It’s hard not to succumb to the feeling of doom as our ecological circumstances get dimmer by the day. Thinking about the future is a scary subject. But while stories like Arco don’t shy away from the exercise, the upcoming film does fortunately paint a prettier, more hopeful future with iridescent imagery and a surprisingly mature message.
Directed by Ugo Bienvenu from a script co-written with Félix de Givry, Arco tells a tale of two futures. Part-time travel story, part bittersweet coming of age, the animated film feels like a quiet revolution. While deceptively simple, it’s got a lot on its mind — and though it can’t articulate all of its ideas with equal fervor, it certainly gets bonus points for filtering it all through the lens of its unlikely, era-spanning friendship.
