Dir: John Musker & Ron Clements. US. 2002. 95 mins.

Walt Disney Feature Animation follow up the delightful Lilo & Stitch with a more conventional holiday programmer in Treasure Planet, an entertaining, but perfunctory animated adventure which will come third on kids' wishlists after live-action family movies Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets and The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers. Written, produced and directed by Musker & Clements, the creative duo behind Aladdin, The Little Mermaid and Hercules, it bears the Disney imprimatur of sophisticated animation and efficient storytelling but lacks the character and humour which gave Aladdin and The Little Mermaid such a timeless quality.

Reminiscent of Fox Animation's disastrous Titan AE in that it follows a teenager on adventures in space, but fortunately injecting some of the fun of Star Wars into the mix, Treasure Planet stands to be a medium-range box-office performer in the mighty Disney animated canon. It has more in common with Tarzan than Lilo & Stitch, in that it is all-out adventure rather than a cute fantasy, but, in this competitive environment, it will be hard-pressed to do even half of the $447m which the jungle-swinger racked up worldwide. BVI opened the film in Paris for a limited run before the US and worldwide openings (except for Japan later next year) will follow swiftly on the domestic opening Nov 27.

Retelling Treasure Island in a futuristic science fiction setting gave animators a chance to come up with some experimental visuals: the combination of hand-drawn and digitally composed animation generates some eye-popping backdrops and "sets". Musker & Clements remain faithful to their 19th-century source novel, however, incorporating space galleons and Stevenson-esque taverns into the mix.

The film starts on the planet of Montressor (not dissimilar to Luke Skywalker's home planet Tattooine) where Jim Hawkins (voiced by Gordon-Levitt), a lonely 15-year-old yearning for adventure lives with his mother (voiced by Metcalf), the proprietress of the Benbow Inn. Their lives are thrown upside down, however, when a dying alien named Billy Bones (McGoohan) crash lands his space cruiser near the Inn and stumbles into Jim, handing him a gold metallic sphere which holds a 3-D holographic map identifying the location of the legendary Treasure Planet - home to Captain Flint's stolen treasure.

Hot on Bones' heels are a band of pirates in search of the map who ransack the inn. Determined to help his mother rebuild the inn with the treasure, Jim and a family friend Dr Delbert Doppler (Hyde Pierce) embark on an expedition on the space galleon Legacy captained by the alien officer Amelia (the distinctive tones of Emma Thompson).

But, unbeknownst to Jim, Doppler and Amelia, the ship is crewed by the pirates including the cyborg cook John Silver for whom Jim is commanded to work. The two develop a friendship of sorts, but Jim overhears a meeting of the pirates soon afterwards and he, Doppler and Amelia escape in one of the galleon's "longboats" on to Treasure Planet, with Silver in hot pursuit.

Like in Tarzan, songs - this time by Goo Goo Dolls frontman John Rzeznik - are used on the soundtrack to assist the action, without intruding into it.

Prod cos: Walt Disney Pictures
Worldwide dist: Buena Vista/BVI
Prods: Roy Conli, John Musker & Ron Clements
Scr: Clements & Musker & Rob Edwards, from the novel Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson. Animation story by Clements & Musker, Ted Elliott & Terry Rossio
Art direction: Andy Giskell
Ed: Michael Kelly
Mus: James Newton Howard
Main voice cast: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Brian Murray, Emma Thompson, David Hyde Pierce, Martin Short, Dane A Davis, Michael Wincott, Laurie Metcalf, Roscoe Lee Browne, Patrick McGoohan