Tomorrowland, named after Disneyland’s future-themed neighborhood, is Spy Kids in space. Which turns out not be a bad thing although it may come as a surprise to those who have watched George Clooney do the endless P.R. rounds, hefting his epic charm as if it were Thor’s hammer.

On screen, the crinkly-eyed mega-star and activist — who plays spunky boy inventor turned fifty-something paranoid crank Frank Walker — disappears from the movie for nearly an hour in a very awkward and not particularly magical script bubble.

Precocious prepubescent Walker escapes to the future with his home-made jet-pack created from an Electrolux vacuum cleaner, landing in a silver-and-light Oz of the future that would have suited The Jetsons. (Interesting side note: at the theme park, Tomorrowland was intended to be 1986. So, if you’re relatively into Einstein, the future is technically the past).

Walker the boy makes this time leap from the 1964 World’s Fair in Flushing Meadows Park with the help of a magic pin handed to him by a girl named Athena (Raffey Cassidy). If you know your mythology, Athena cracked out of Zeus’s head with an unmatched warrior spirit, which is what the Greek Gods had instead of spunk.
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