THERE'S A telling moment at the beginning of "Treasure Planet," Walt Disney's latest animated feature.
A 10-year-old boy, Jim, is reading a bedtime book about pirates. But this is no ordinary book, it's an audiovisual extravaganza, with the flash and boom of pirate cannon shooting out from the pages.
This Pandora's box-like effect is magical. And while you sigh inwardly at the idea that Robert Louis Stevenson's "Treasure Island" may only reach kids as a special effects/animated movie, well, you have to surrender and enjoy the spectacle.
As far as modernizing the Stevenson classic, "Treasure Planet" is as canny a job as you could expect. The film may not have the classic timelessness of "The Little Mermaid," "Aladdin" and "The Lion King." But co-directors John Musker and Ron Clements (who made "Mermaid" and "Aladdin") know how to put on a Disney show.
Set in the future, where the ocean is now outer space and the ships are floating pirate galleons, this story's about Jim (voice of Joseph Gordon-Levitt), who has now grown up to be a spaceboard-surfing dude with lousy behavior and grades, a disappointment to his innkeeper mom. As always in the fairy tale/myth/biblical traditions, Jim's father skedaddled long ago.
When Jim gets wind of a map to a planet laden with treasure, his life's mission is set. Mother's inn is not doing well. And he needs to make a man of himself. With the help of friend and financier Dr. Doppler (David Hyde Pierce), who clearly fancies Jim's mom, Jim joins a space crew of weirdos and oddballs led by the strident Capt. Amelia (Emma Thompson).
Jim finds himself on kitchen duty with Silver (Brian Murray) a part cyborg, part human whose partner is a hilarious twist on Long John Silver's parrot, a gelatinous, shape-shifting thingamablob called Morph. And like Long John, this Silver's less than honest. But he develops a close relationship with Jim along the way.
Morph is one of several engaging updatings, including Jim's ship, an old-time galleon with billowing sails that flies through space powered by space-age jets. And there's something ancient and futuristic about this utterance from a dying man: "Beware the cyborg."
The visuals are some of Disney's best. Jim and company withstand the monstrous pull of a black hole, like an old-time ship crew meeting the might of an ocean tempest. And the port city they encounter is an impressively epic location à la Lucas.
The movie also satisfies that recent Disney tradition: the comedy corner for grown-ups (the high-water-mark standard set by Robin Williams in "Aladdin"). In this case, it's Martin Short, who plays a robotic character named B.E.N. (which stands for Bio-Electronic-Navigator). B.E.N., who's missing a major piece of brain circuitry, is unable to follow a single train of thought. But it doesn't stop his free association motor-mouth. Short's seemingly ceaseless ability to improvise (with a little hint of Jiminy Glick, Short's hilarious character on "Primetime Glick") should tickle kids and their stressed out parents. "Stop me if I rambling," says B.E.N. after one machine-gun torrent of chatter. Oh go ahead, Martin. Ramble away.
TREASURE PLANET (PG, 95 minutes) -- Contains adventure action and peril. Area theaters.
