There was a real heart felt quality to it. The look is different. Astro Boy is the Japanese Mickey Mouse, but this movie is made in Hong Kong. It’s not your typical Japanese animation. There’s also a beautiful old fashion Hollywood score from John Ottman.

I know a lot of people who see this film are going to think the story is a rip-off of Spielberg’s AI. Fact is, writer Ian Watson based his screenplay on Brian Aldiss’s Supertoys Last All Summer Long, who in turn probably lifted it from the first Birth of Astro Boy Japanese comic strip!

So it’s the same story, about a robot builder, who loses his son, builds a robot to replace him, then turns his back on his own creation, which the creator of Astro Boy, Osamu Tezuka “clearly” credited to being his own interpretation of Pinocchio.

I don’t know how well Astro Boy is going to do at the box-office in the US. So few people in America remember who Astro Boy is. But it should do quite well in Asia, where Astro is huge.