The Iron Giant is a 1999 American animated science fiction film produced by Warner Bros. Feature Animation and directed by Brad Bird in his directorial debut. It is loosely based on the 1968 novel The Iron Man by Ted Hughes, and was written by Tim McCanlies from a story treatment by Bird. The film stars the voices of Jennifer Aniston, Harry Connick Jr., Vin Diesel, James Gammon, Cloris Leachman, John Mahoney, Eli Marienthal, Christopher McDonald, and M. Emmet Walsh. Set during the Cold War in 1957, the film centers on a young boy named Hogarth Hughes, who discovers and befriends a giant alien robot. With the help of a beatnik artist named Dean McCoppin, Hogarth attempts to prevent the U.S. military and Kent Mansley, a paranoid federal agent, from finding and destroying the Giant.