Review: 'Mars Needs Moms' blends razzle-dazzle, odd gender politics

One doesn't want to read too much into a movie like "Mars Needs Moms."It is, after all, an animated film about a little boy who finds himself flying to Mars to rescue his mother. Silly stuff, right?

Well, yes, of course. And the fact that it's done in 3-D and available on IMAX screens pushes the fact more. This is just a big rollercoaster of a movie, filled with dazzling effects and funny creatures and the requisite five-hankie "I love you, Mom" ending.

But then, there are some weird gender political battles at play here. They're so weird, in fact, it's hard to tell if they add up to anything. But you'd have to be blind to miss all this stuff.

First off, Mars does apparently need Moms. That's because it's become something of a fascist matriarchal society, in which all male babies are pushed down to a trash dump buried beneath their already-underground civilization. There the males grow up to be primitive, furry party animals with no apparent intellect.

Hmmm. You talking to me?

Back up in Martian civilization, things are run by a dictatorial supervisor (Mindy Sterling) who resembles E.T.'s evil grandma, a withered, wrinkled witch of an alien who has turned all the females into soldiers or workers. The females have become so cut off from their maternal side that the female babies are now raised by robots. But these robots still need some essence of momness in them to successfully nurture the children.

This is where Earth comes in. The supervisor scans the globe until she finds a mother who seems to be successful when it comes to discipline, and then kidnaps the woman and brings her to Mars to sort of drain her essential mom qualities.

The catch is, the ideal mom here is a stay-at-home housewife. Her range includes laundry and cooking and cleaning the house and tucking kids into bed.

You can almost hear the stampede of Women's Studies doctoral candidates trying to file thesis proposals. Interesting reading, only three years away.

Anyway, the perfect mom (Joan Cusack) in this case isn't really all that perfect. Her son Milo (Seth Green, Seth Dusky) is a good kid, but hardly well-disciplined.

But the Martians come for Mom anyway, and when Milo sees them lifting off with her, he scrambles aboard. Next thing you know he's on Mars.

Within moments he's been enticed to the lower-level dumping ground by a pudgy human named Gribble (Dan Fogler). It turns out Gribble followed his mom to the red planet, too, years back. That didn't work out well, but it does allow Gribble to spell out the back story.

The balance of the film — which probably actually will become an amusement park ride — finds Milo and Gribble and a rebellious Martian girl named Ki (Detroit native Elisabeth Harnois) attempting to set the unconscious mom free before her mommy essence is drained and she is left a nothing (take note, doctoral candidates).

It's all exciting enough without being actually mind-blowing.

"Mars" is ably directed and written by animation veteran Simon Wells ("The Prince of Egypt") and based on a book by "Bloom County" cartoonist Berkeley Breathed (investigators, cast your eyes his way).

The film uses the sort of live-motion-based animation that producer Robert Zemeckis has popularized over the past decade ("The Polar Express," "A Christmas Carol"), although most of the characters here don't look quite as zombie-like as in previous efforts. Then again, most of the characters here are Martians.

All in all, it's efficient entertainment that's sure to dazzle the kids. Moms, though, may find themselves thinking, "Hey, wait a minute …"

'Mars Needs Moms'

GRADE: B-

Rated PG: For sci-fi action and peril

Running time: 88 minutes