The beauty of simplicity is that recreating it in art actually takes a good amount of complexity. Truly affecting the wonder of the everyday takes commitment and skill. Pablo Berger’s Robot Dreams is a testament to that commitment and skill. The film was nominated for Best Animated Feature in last year’s Academy Awards, but their savvy (and four-time Palme D’or-winning) distributor, Neon, held off on a theatrical release until this Summer. The production was a European affair – both Spanish and French money went into it – but this might be the best New York City movie of the year. This is the first time director Pablo Berger has made an animated film, and his rookie luck hits big time. A light comedy about a devoted relationship between a dog and a robot, Robot Dreams transforms into an impactful story about the lingering memory of love.

At 102 minutes, Robot Dreams contains no dialogue, braving to instead take advantage of the wide range of expression that animated filmmaking provides. Our protagonist is Dog, a melancholy loner living in 1980s New York. I specify the time despite the fact that this version of New York is completely devoid of human life. All of the characters occupying this metropolis are animals personified with various human personalities. A barrel-chested rhino delivers the mail, an octopus uses its eight legs to perform a stellar bucket drum solo on the subway platform. There are cultural markers (the most direct reference being a suggestion that a dog version of Ronald Reagan sits in the White House) that make our timeframe clear with precise detail. The only thing different is that Dog is not a man, but a Dog.

His morose life is made up mostly of microwavable dinners eaten alone in front of the droning television. When a commercial comes on marketing a robot companion, Dog sees a chance to end his loneliness once and for all. After the rhino makes its delivery, Dog gets started on assembly, building a robot that looks like a quaint version of the giant from The Iron Giant. A silver humanoid with a permanent smile on his face, Robot is everything that Dog wanted. Dog soon takes his new friend on many adventures through the city, including the subway and Central Park, where they have a delightful dance to the tune of Earth, Wind & Fire’s “September”. The two become very intimate friends, but after they spend a long, hot day on the beach, trouble arises when Robot rusts in place and Dog is unable to move him.

With the beach closed for the season, and after exhausting every other possible option, Dog resigns himself to waiting months for the beach to reopen and to get his friend back. In the interim, Dog and Robot live full lives. Dog makes friends with a bowling snowman and goes fishing with a razor cool duck, while Robot’s existence is mostly in his mind, dreaming of the various things he will do when reunited with Dog again. Robot Dreams sets up a premise in its first half-hour – Dog must find a way to get Robot out of the beach – but then whimsically spins away from it. The central connection of the story falls further and further into the background. In this middle section, Dreams feels more like a collection of animated shorts than it does a single feature, but the story and the animation never lose their unique charm.

And then we get to the film’s conclusion, which delivers on the promise of a reunion without selling out the separation that preceded it. The meandering that you’ve witnessed for the previous 45 minutes is brought together with stunning clarity and the central theme of the film – the intense perseverance of personal connection – comes back to the forefront. Robot Dreams builds its ending with the foundation of many other great romances, but the movie’s singular aesthetic still makes its emotional impact quite effective. Berger doesn’t hide the fact that this is a love story (a queer love story at that), but the lack of explicit statement (in fact, the lack of any statement at all), leaves the audience with just the unvarnished feelings of Robot and Dog. And that’s a recipe for the most satisfying ending of the Summer.

 

Directed by Pablo Berger