The Mitchells vs. The Machines

The Mitchells vs. The Machines
Directed by	Mike Rianda
Co-Directed by	Jeff Rowe
Produced by	Phil Lord Christopher Miller Kurt Albrecht
Written by	Mike Rianda Jeff Rowe
Starring	Abbi Jacobson Danny McBride Maya Rudolph Eric Andre Fred Armisen Beck Bennett Conan O'Brien Charlyne Yi Sasheer Zamata Mike Rianda Olivia Colman
Narrated by	Abbi Jacobson
Music by	Mark Mothersbaugh
Editing by	Greg Levitan
Studio	Columbia Pictures Sony Pictures Animation Lord Miller Productions One Cool Films
Distributed by	Netflix
Running time	113 minutes
Country
Language	English
Aspect Ratio	2.35:1
Rating	for action and some language
Budget	$50–100 million

The Mitchells vs. The Machines is a 2021 American computer-animated science fiction comedy film produced by Sony Pictures Animation. The film was directed by Mike Rianda (in his feature directorial debut), co-directed by Jeff Rowe, and written by Rianda and Rowe, with Phil Lord, Christopher Miller, and Kurt Albrecht serving as producers. It stars the voices of Abbi Jacobson, Danny McBride, Maya Rudolph, Eric André, Olivia Colman, Fred Armisen, Beck Bennett, John Legend, Chrissy Teigen, Blake Griffin, and Conan O'Brien. The film follows a dysfunctional family that winds up having to save the planet from a global robot uprising while on a road trip.

The film was originally planned to be released theatrically by Sony Pictures Releasing under the title Connected in 2020, but due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on movie theaters, Sony sold the main distribution rights to Netflix. Netflix retitled it to Rianda and Rowe's preferred title, The Mitchells vs. the Machines, and released it in select theaters on April 23, 2021, before its streaming release a week later. The film received critical acclaim for its animation, themes, humor, and LGBT representation.

Plot

Katie Mitchell is a quirky aspiring filmmaker in Kentwood, Michigan, who often clashes with her nature-obsessed and technophobic father Rick, and has recently been accepted into film school in California. The rest of the family includes her Mom, Linda who tries to be motivating to everyone, Katie's brother Aaron hangs out with her but has a love for dinosaurs. Katie often felt like an outcast as a kid since no one in school really got her films, aside from Aaron, who often made movies with her. After meeting some of the other freshman, they became her new friends and Katie had found her people. The evening before Katie leaves, Rick accidentally breaks her laptop after a fight over one of Katie's previous short films, leading the family to fear their relationship will forever be strained. After dinner, Rick still doesn't understand what went wrong, Linda tries to explain that because he and Katie have been fighting all the time, they haven't been able to pull off a decent family photo but also the way things looked tonight, Katie may not come home ever again. To try to prevent this, Rick decides to cancel Katie's flight and instead take her, her mother Linda, younger brother Aaron, and family dog Monchi on a cross-country road trip to her college as one last bonding experience. Unfortunately Katie is anything but excited because not only will she miss orientation week but also miss some exciting first week thrills at school. Katie decides to film all the families disastrous moments such as eating bad food, getting pulled over, riding donkeys in the rain and even a montage of the dog kissing Rick.

Meanwhile, technology entrepreneur Mark Bowman declares his highly intelligent AI PAL obsolete as he unveils a new line of home robots to replace her. In revenge, PAL sabotages Mark's company and orders all the robots to capture humans worldwide and launch them into space. PAL does stay, she'll call off the launch if Mark can give her one good reasons why humans should be here, unfortunately Bowman only says because of "love" which she rejects within seconds. In addition she turns off the world's wifi which sends people into a panic and tricking them into going into a space probe. The Mitchells manage to avoid capture at a road stop café in Kansas. Rick decides that his family should stay put in the café for their own safety, but Katie convinces him to help save the world instead. They meet two defective robots, Eric and Deborahbot 5000, who tell the family they can use a kill code to shut down PAL and all the robots. To do this they can either go to the closest computer hub and enter the kill code via laptop or go to Silicon Valley to shut down everything manually. The family decides to go to the nearest mall as Silicon Valley would be heavily guarded.

The Mitchells make it to a mall in Bloomington, Minnesota to upload the kill code, but PAL chip-enabled appliances attempt to stop them. Katie tries to upload the kill code, but is stopped when a giant Furby pursues the family. They ultimately trap and defeat the Furby, destroying a PAL router in the process, which disables the hostile devices but stops the kill code from uploading. On the way to Silicon Valley to upload the kill code directly to PAL, Linda reveals to Katie that she and Rick had originally lived in a cabin in the mountains years ago as it was his lifelong dream before he gave up on it.

Upon arriving in Silicon Valley, the Mitchells disguise themselves as robots and head to PAL Labs HQ to shut it down, but PAL manipulates them by revealing surveillance footage from the café of Katie telling Aaron in secret that she was pretending to have faith in Rick so that he would take them to upload the kill code. As a heartbroken Rick sees this, the Mitchells fail to reach PAL's lair and Rick and Linda are captured by PAL's stronger and smarter robots. PAL then reprograms Eric and Deborahbot to obey her, while Katie, Aaron, and Monchi escape.

Katie discovers Rick's recordings of her childhood on her camera, realizing that Rick gave up on his lifelong dream to give his daughter a normal life. In the meantime, Rick reflects on his actions after seeing one of Katie's videos that mirrors his relationship with Katie. Reinvigorated, Katie and Aaron infiltrate PAL Labs HQ again, this time using Monchi to malfunction the robots, as his appearance causes an error in their programming. With help from Mark, Rick and Linda free themselves and plan to upload Katie's home movie of Monchi to short-circuit the robots. However, Rick is outnumbered by the robots when he is about to upload the video, while Katie and Aaron are captured.

Facing PAL to justify saving humanity, Katie explains that no matter how hard her family struggles, they will always stay connected despite how different they are. PAL rejects this reasoning and drops Katie from her lair. Eric and Deborahbot, having been inspired by Rick's "reprogramming" himself that allowed him to use a computer, revert to their malfunctioning states and upload Katie's home movie, saving her and helping the rest of the Mitchells. The family bands together to fight the rest of the robots. Katie eventually destroys PAL by dropping her into a glass of water, freeing all the humans and disabling the remaining robots.

A few months after the uprising, Katie and her family arrive at her college as she shares one last goodbye with them. She later joins them on another road trip with Eric and Deborahbot to Washington, D.C. to accept the Congressional Gold Medal.

Cast

• Abbi Jacobson as Katie Mitchell, an aspiring filmmaker who is the daughter of Rick and Linda, and Aaron's older sister.
• Danny McBride as Rick Mitchell, the nature-obsessed and technophobic father of Katie and Aaron, and Linda's husband.
• Maya Rudolph as Linda Mitchell, the mother of Katie and Aaron, and Rick's wife.
• Mike Rianda as Aaron Mitchell, the dinosaur-loving son of Rick and Linda, and Katie's younger brother.
  • Rianda also voices a talking dog, the Furbies, a Giant Furby and a Wi-Fi enthusiast.
• Olivia Colman as PAL, a ruthless, arrogant and maniacal rogue virtual assistant created by Mark, who wants to exact revenge on humankind after being discarded as obsolete.
• Eric André as Dr. Mark Bowman, a scientist who is the founder of PAL Labs and creator of PAL.
• Fred Armisen as Deborahbot 5000, a damaged PAL Max robot from PAL Labs who helps the Mitchells.
• Beck Bennett as Eric, a damaged PAL Max robot also from PAL Labs who helps the Mitchells.
  • Bennett also voices the other PAL Max robots in the film.
• John Legend as Jim Posey, the Mitchells' neighbor and Hailey's husband
• Chrissy Teigen as Hailey Posey, the Mitchells' neighbor and Jim's wife who Linda has often tried to get the respect of.
• Charlyne Yi as Abbey Posey, the dinosaur-loving daughter of the Mitchells' neighbors, Jim and Hailey Posey, and Aaron's crush.
• Blake Griffin as PAL Max Prime, a sleek robot from PAL Labs created by PAL that serves as an upgraded version of the PAL Max line.
• Conan O'Brien as Glaxxon 5000, a PAL Max robot from PAL Labs who appears in the Foolish Human Air video.
• Doug the Pug as Monchi, the Mitchell family's pet dog.
• Sasheer Zamata as Jade, Katie's groupmate and later girlfriend.
• Elle Mills as Hanna, Katie's groupmate.
• Alex Hirsch as Dirk, Katie's groupmate.
• Jay Pharoah as Noah
• Grey Griffin as a stagehand

Production

On May 22, 2018, Sony Pictures Animation announced the title of a Phil Lord and Christopher Miller-produced animated film that was in development, entitled The Mitchells vs. the Machines. The film is the duo's fourth collaboration with SPA following the two Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs films and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, as well as the studio's first original feature film since The Star. Mike Rianda and Jeff Rowe, former writers of the Disney Channel animated series Gravity Falls, served as the film's screenwriters, with Rianda serving as director and Rowe as co-director.

Further details were revealed a year later, when Sony Animation president Kristine Belson revealed that the film would be using an art style similar to Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, and that the worlds the Mitchell family and the robots live in are initially separate universes before colliding. Animation work at Sony Pictures Imageworks had already begun the previous month, as confirmed by animator Nick Kondo on Twitter.

On February 19, 2020, Abbi Jacobson was cast as Katie Mitchell. This was followed by the casting announcements of Danny McBride, Maya Rudolph, Mike Rianda, Eric Andre, and Olivia Colman the next day.

On February 20, 2020, images were revealed through Entertainment Weekly, and it was announced the title was changed from The Mitchells vs. the Machines to Connected. On January 21, 2021, Netflix announced they had bought the film and were reverting back to the original name.

Following the release of the first trailer, Phil Lord announced on Twitter that his frequent collaborator Mark Mothersbaugh will compose the score for the film.

Release

The Mitchells vs. the Machines was originally scheduled to be theatrically released by Sony Pictures Releasing in the United States on January 10, 2020, but was later delayed to September 18 of that year. It was delayed again to October 23, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The film was later removed from the release schedule in October, though the film was still set to be released later in 2020 at the time of the film's removal.

On January 21, 2021, Netflix bought the worldwide distribution rights to the film for about $110 million, with Sony retaining distribution rights in China. Two months later on March 23, they announced that the film would be released on April 30, following a limited theatrical release a week earlier on April 23.

Reception

On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 98% based on 180 reviews with an average rating of 8.20/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "Eye-catching and energetic, The Mitchells vs. the Machines delivers a funny, feel-good story that the whole family can enjoy." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 80 out of 100 based on 31 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews."

The film was praised by critics for putting an openly LGBT character, Katie, as the central figure of a family-oriented animated movie. Rianda and Rowe wrote Katie to be unambiguously LGBT in consultation with LGBT members of their production team, but did not seek to make it part of the central conflict with her father, considering her sexuality "normal in real life". Michelle Yang of NBC News gave the film a positive review and lauded the film for its LGBTQ+ representation (particularly the character of Katie, whom she called a relatable and inspirational protagonist), stating that the film "treats its protagonist's identity matter-of-factly but with care — which is exactly how it ought to be."

Benjamin Lee of The Guardian gave the film a 4 out of 5 star rating, stating that "The frantic, anything-goes nature of their films, both in tone and visuals, belies a tight focus on storytelling and dialogue with sight gags and set pieces used to supplement rather than distract" and "It’s also genuinely funny, a credit not only to the hit-a-minute script but also to a finely picked cast of comic actors, of unusually high calibre," while also praising the animation, calling it "part of the energetic oeuvre of Phil Lord and Chris Miller." Matt Fowler of IGN gave the film an 8 out of 10, stating that "The Mitchells vs. The Machines is a ridiculous, riotous, and relevant adventure fill with great humor and winning sentiment. It's fast-moving and gorgeous to behold, filled with quirks, quips, and a lovably goblin-like pug ("voiced" by IG-famous Doug the Pug). It's a good time for both younglings and elders, delivering an intelligently goofy rush of new animation and old emotion." David Rooney of The Hollywood Reporter gave the film a positive review, stating that "Ultimately, this is an original adventure that feels stitched together out of a hundred familiar film plots, often freely acknowledging its pop-cultural plundering, as in the family’s obligatory slo-mo power strut away from a building exploding in flames. But for audiences content with rapid-fire juvenilia, the busy patchwork of prefab elements will be entertaining enough" although he said that "I wish the film’s laughs were as consistent as its energy, giving its able voice cast better material, and that there had been more distinctive story beats." Richard Trenholm of CNET also gave the film a positive review, stating that " one of the best new family movies on Netflix" and that it is a "family film that has a message for all the family, not just the youngsters. Yes, like most films of this ilk it encourages kids to be themselves. But it also nudges parents not to stress about social media, and to value their kids' creativity -- even if what the kids create doesn't make a lick of sense." Brian Tallerico of RogerEbert.com gave the film 3 out of 4 stars, calling the film "Like a mash-up of an ‘80s family road comedy like Vacation and the visions of a tech apocalypse foretold in films like The Terminator,” Netflix’s “The Mitchells vs. the Machines” is a lot of nostalgic fun but told in a modern style" and stating that it is "threaded with clever commentary on our reliance on tech and featuring some incredibly strong design work, this is a pleasant surprise for families looking for something new this season, and one of the more purely enjoyable Netflix animated films in a while."

External links

• The Mitchells vs. The Machines at IMDb
• The Mitchells vs. The Machines at Box Office Mojo
• The Mitchells vs. The Machines at Rotten Tomatoes
• The Mitchells vs. The Machines at Metacritic