{"id":55767,"date":"2025-08-09T00:48:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-09T00:48:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/55767\/"},"modified":"2025-08-09T00:48:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-09T00:48:08","slug":"a-delightfully-idiosyncratic-indie-toon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/55767\/","title":{"rendered":"A Delightfully Idiosyncratic Indie Toon"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tExtraterrestrial influencers making social media content about human food, a scientist producing genetically modified fruits and the soul-sucking dangers of capitalist hustle culture all come together in \u201cBoys Go to Jupiter<\/a>.\u201d Inherently unexpected in the landscape of American independent film, Julian Glander<\/a>\u2019s idiosyncratic delight is the rare animated feature made outside of this country\u2019s major studios. With his hilariously offbeat, uniquely stylized and surreptitiously profound debut, Glander joins a small but notable list of directors daring enough to try their hand at indie animation in the U.S., joining the ranks of Bill Plympton, Dash Shaw and Don Hertzfeldt.<\/p>\n

\n\tBillboards preaching threatening Bible verses and orange groves with sinister origins proliferate in the Florida beach town where \u201cBoys Go to Jupiter\u201d unfurls. There resides brooding 16-year-old Billy 5000 (Jack Corbett), who has left his childish interests behind to become preoccupied with making money delivering food via an app called Grubster (the reference to a real-life service couldn\u2019t be more intentional). He\u2019s dropped out of school without telling his older sister (voiced by \u201cSorry, Baby\u201d director Eva Victor), and ditched his younger, rowdy friends Freckles (Grace Kuhlenschmidt), Beatbox (Elsie Fisher) and the adorably inopportune Peanut (J. R Phillips). Hoping to make $5,000 in order to move out, Billy travels tirelessly from one address to the next day and night on his hoverboard.<\/p>\n

\n\tEach delivery unveils a new revelatory interaction with custumers or food service workers, all of whom are eager to unload the burden of their lonely thoughts on Billy. But it\u2019s also thanks to these transactional exchanges that he comes into contact with Rozebud (Miya Folick), a possible romantic interest who is oblivious to her privilege as the daughter of an orange tycoon. But first, and with no clear reason, a couple of alien creatures \u2014 blue blobs that mimic human speech \u2014 also pop their smiley faces into Billy\u2019s industrious fund chasing.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe computer-generated world of \u201cBoys Go to Jupiter\u201d charms with its inviting plasticity. When observed up close, the characters almost resemble Playmobil figurines moving inside backdrops that look as if made of pristine digital clay. The way the lighting hits surfaces paired with the vibrant colors tricks the eye into thinking these scenes are real. That\u2019s how Glander\u2019s 3D aesthetic distinguishes itself from the humdrum designs of most big-budget CG animation. There are limitations to the characters\u2019 movement and expressiveness here that don\u2019t read as shortcomings, but rather the built-in quirks the filmmaking is creating around.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe film\u2019s smooth textures, bubblegum-hued veneer and cheeky quips could seem in contrast with its big-issue themes \u2014 namely the exploitation of workers and the commodification of labor. Yet, one sequence that looks at the town from above, likening the lives of locals to how an ant colony operates, illustrates how Glander\u2019s chosen form often complements the substance.<\/p>\n

\n\tCentral to Glander\u2019s narrative is the notion that capitalism corrodes every aspect of existence, forcing people to think about whatever they do in terms of its market value. In order to succeed, citizens\u2019 every waking moment must be spent striving to earn more income. Thus, for a working-class boy of Billy\u2019s age, $5,000 feels like a life-altering sum that may open the door to a modicum of independence\u2014 that\u2019s how much he\u2019s offered to betray a new friend.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe crushing truth, however, is that the videos Billy watches on how to \u201cmanifest\u201d financial abundance as a way for upward mobility ignore the specific circumstances and systemic obstacles that keep him and most people away from wealth. In one of the film\u2019s most piercing scenes, an employee of Dolphin Groves (owned by Rozebud\u2019s mother) confesses he buys lottery tickets not because he thinks he\u2019ll ever win, but because up until the moment the winner is announced, he\u2019s able to fantasize about what he would do if money was no longer scarce in his life.<\/p>\n

\n\tThis futile pursuit of a streamlined path into a better life has robbed Billy not only of his carefree youth but also of his academic potential: He\u2019s a math prodigy who won\u2019t pursue a college education. That Jack Corbett, popular online for making TikTok videos about the economy for NPR, voices the teenage protagonist adds a metatextual quality of the film. (The impressive cast also includes comedians such as Janeane Garofalo, Julio Torres, Sarah Sherman and Joe Pera.)<\/p>\n

\n\tOn top of its many visual pleasures and fantastical musings, \u201cBoys Go to Jupiter\u201d is also essentially a musical, where Billy and other characters break into songs whose lyrics provide humorous insight into their emotional concerns (Freckles\u2019 track praises the culinary versatility of eggs). Created by Glander himself, the tunes sound as if hand-picked from alternative rock albums from the 2000s and 2010s. These musical moments turn into flights of fancy where the director fully embraces the medium\u2019s aptness for whimsy.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhat could have resulted in a mishmash of kooky concepts instead comes together as a strangely cohesive testament to Glander\u2019s writing and imaginative world-building. As wonderfully funny as \u201cBoys Go to Jupiter\u201d is, what makes this micro-production superior to macro-budget studio features is the heartfelt melancholy about the future the hero conveys, which it provides with class consciousness to boot.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Extraterrestrial influencers making social media content about human food, a scientist producing genetically modified fruits and the soul-sucking…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":55768,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[37122,49,48,75,37123,337],"class_list":["post-55767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-boys-go-to-jupiter","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment","tag-julian-glander","tag-movies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55767\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}