Image Credit: Tomorrowland

My husband, son, and I saw Tomorrowland in the theater last night, along with my husband’s family.  

It was definitely a movie that I wanted to see at some point, but I honestly wasn’t super interested in it.  The trailers had been so cryptic about the actual storyline that they hadn’t piqued my interest enough to have me begging to see more.

My mind quickly changed, however, as the movie started.

Image Credit: Point of Geeks

First of all, when we got there, it was a couple of minutes into the film and we caught just the very end of “There’s a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow,” which theme park lovers know as the theme song of Walt Disney’s “Carousel of Progress” attraction in Tomorrowland.  That got me excited right away!  

Image Credit: slashfilm

As if that weren’t enough Disney nostalgia for me, the opening sequence also included the debut of “it’s a small world” at the 1964 World’s Fair.  (Both Carousel of Progress and “it’s a small world” started there.)  You even get to hop on the ride with the film characters for a bit.  I’m not going to lie; I was clapping in my theater seat like a little kid.  And I was hooked into the movie after that.

Image Credit: Moviez Guru

I’m not into futurism and science fiction landscapes, but I thought Tomorrowland’s scenery was beautiful.  And, it was made complete by Space Mountain’s presence.  I don’t think they would have done justice to the name Tomorrowland if they hadn’t included that structure.  

On a different note, lead actress Britt Robertson reminded me so much of Maya (Sabrina Carpenter) from Disney Channel’s “Girl Meets World.”  It was really throwing me off for awhile.  If you’ve seen the show, I’m sure you’ll notice the resemblance.

Image Credit: Turn the Right Corner

The film is rated PG.  I would warn that (especially for younger kids, like my own), there are some pretty creepy scenes.  There isn’t blood and gore, but there is violence with very life-like robots, which was disturbing (even for me) at times.  There is also a decent amount of “mild” language, including many uses of
“he_ _,” a couple of “OMGs” and unfinished “son of a —s,” and even the “D” word.  Again, probably not too disturbing for an older kid, but my son was uncomfortable with the language and I thought it was unnecessary in a family movie.

The storyline, paired with the scenery and some great characters (You’ll love Athena.), kept my interest throughout the movie.  It dealt with themes of hope and despair, of imagination and the ordinary.  Much like Walt Disney’s “Keep moving forward” quote, the movie encourages us to “Never give up.”

“Around here, however, we don’t look backwards for very long. We keep moving forward, opening up new doors and doing new things, because we’re curious…and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.”  ~ Walt Disney 

Have you seen Tomorrowland?  What are you thoughts about the movie?