Cirque Stumbles a Bit on Imax ‘Journey’

Imax 3-D seems an ideal medium for the Cirque du Soleil, but their first collaboration, “Journey of Man,” proves to be an arty, kitschy allegory.

After a prologue featuring taiko drummers in a cave, we are plunged undersea for an aquatic ballet celebrating the birth of human life. A little boy, Infant (Cully Smoller), explodes from the briny deep into a leafy glade, where he is greeted in the forest primeval by the clown-like shamans, the Flounes (Josette Dechene, Paul Vachon), who introduce him to joy, fear, courage and wonder. The latter emotion is elicited by a fanciful Bungee act, a popular Cirque attraction, in which the performers are dressed like yellow bird-like creatures.

The boy, now a Youth (Chris van Wagenen), is next transported to a dramatic rocky landscape--actually, Nevada’s Valley of Fire State Park--where muscular Mikhail Matorin, a Cirque stalwart, is balancing and spinning a large metallic cube on a mountain parapet as a prelude to his spectacular flying routine. Having gotten an idea of how challenging life can be, the Youth becomes a Young Man (Nicky Dewhurst), whom we meet on the grounds of a vast estate with a reflecting pool, where a pair of marble statues, a man (Yves Decoste) and a woman (Marie-Laure Mesnage), come to life to perform a balancing act on an outsize lily pad.

Although the number is more gymnastic than erotic, the Young Man discovers the notion of love in contemplating them. But he apparently doesn’t get the message, for when we discover him as a Mature Adult (Kenny Raskin), he is quite alone in his palatial residence--represented by the Grecian deco lobby of Severance Hall, a former Cleveland movie palace. But soon the lobby is filled by shabbily dressed acrobats (members of the Cirque’s Banquine troupe). So impressed is he by the troupe that he forsakes materialism and embraces a rainbow coalition of young people, proceeding in Old Age (Brian Dewhurst) to visit Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate, symbol of a new beginning.

Individual acts are thrilling in Imax 3-D, but stringing them together in so precious an allegory, as producer-writer Peter Wagg, co-writer Steve Roberts and director Keith Melton have, seems unnecessary and silly. No doubt small children and admirers of the Liberace aesthetic will be delighted.

* MPAA rating: G. Times guidelines: suitable for all ages.

‘Journey of Man’

Mikhail Matorin: Cube Act

Yves Decoste: Statue Act

Marie-Laure Mesnage: Statue Act

Josette Dechene, Paul Vachon: Flounes

A Sony Pictures Classics presentation of a Cirque du Soleil/Motion International production. Director Keith Melton. Producers Peter Wagg and Andre Picard. Executive producer Mitchell Cannold. Screenplay by Steve Roberts & Peter Wagg. Cinematographer Reed Smoot. Cinematographer for Banquine sequence John Hora. 3-D and visual effects supervisor Peter Anderson. Editor Harry B. Miller III. Music Benoit Jutras. Costumes for “Man” Mark Bridges; swimmers’ costume adaptation by Gail McMullen. Production designer John Zachary. Running time: 38 minutes.

At Imax Theaters at: Universal CityWalk, (818) 598-0588; Valencia Grand Palace Stadium Cinemas, (661) 287-1740; Irvine Spectrum, (714) 832-IMAX; and Ontario Stadium 22, (909) 476-1500.