Set in the future, Earth is under attack by the Drej aliens. Young Cale (Matt Damon) is separated from his father in the race to escape. After a catastrophic explosion, Earth ceases to exist. Humans are now homeless refuges, struggling to survive in a hostile galaxy dominated by aliens.
Fifteen years later, Cale is a rebellious teenager. He soon learns that his father has left him a ring containing a map to a legendary spacecraft, the Titan, which holds the secret to salvation for the human race. With the aid of Joe Corso (Bill Pullman) - the Captain of the spaceship Valkyrie, Akima (Drew Barrymore) - a beautiful pilot and a crew of assorted aliens, Cale embarks on an adventure though space.
With the Drej close behind, Cale must become a new kind of hero as he completes his mission to find a whole new world.
Agent Keith Dehle
In a nutshell, Titan AE is about the blowing up of Earth by alien invaders, the escape of some humans in space ships, the separation of a father from his son, and the resulting intergalactic search for each other and a new home.
The start of the film may leave you wondering if you are a little too mature for it - the opening scenes would suggest it's aimed at the younger set, somewhere in between Hi-5 and Garfield.
But not far into the movie, it takes on more of an "adult" feeling. No, there is no nudity or crudity, but the animation touches on the erotic - a young blonde muscular guy complete with tattoo in muscle shirt and tight clinging "spacewear" (featuring the voice of Matt); the young slim exotic female space pilot with a confident sexy voice (Drew). Throw in a bit of sexual tension along the way and, voilà, the film starts appealing to the more hormonal viewers.
The animation appears to becomes more detailed and more visually stimulating as the story unfolds. The blowing up of Earth is way cool and many of the space scenes are really colourful and the background animation totally trippy, the animation of the actual characters is a bit tame by comparison but this tends to make the background action appear all that more awesome.
The sound track has a good orchestral score throughout and a few contemporary songs thrown in for good measure by artists including fun lovin' criminals, Jamiroquai and Texas. There're lots of shoot ‘em up scenes that allow you to crank up the volume and test the effectiveness of your surround sound set-up.
Oh, and the ending's not too bad either!
For extra entertainment and educational value, watch the film again with the director's commentary.
PG (Low level violence)
95 minutes (1:35 hours)
DVD rental: 4 July 2001
VHS rental: 4 July 2001
DVD retail: 15 May 2002
VHS retail: 15 May 2002