Spoilers below … but not for this movie … if you’re seeing “Wicked” any time soon, best not read the last paragraph.

Though I was really looking forward to seeing this movie, I have to admit I didn’t really know exactly what it’d be. After a year or so of doing so, I still find myself calling myself a Neil Gaiman fan even though I’ve never read a word of his writing outside his blog, lol. This following MirrorMask, Beowulf later this month, and Coraline next year, will surely get me to the books eventually.

When it comes to this type of movie the quality range is vast from The Princess Bride via Shrek through to the abominable Ella Enchanted. I think it was Mark Kermode who preferred to compare this to Time Bandits and I can see that too. But this is really more its own creature. Ultimately it kind of defied everything I expected from what initially appeared to me to be quite a messy opening. There are a lot of different stories here that come together in the end, and though it takes its time, it’s ultimately quite amazing how the screenplay juggles them (could Jonathan Ross be gracing the Oscars next year not as a host and critic but as a nominee’s guest, perhaps?)

The magic and enchantment stuff is … well, magical. It gave me that kind of feeling like when you’re a child and you actually believe in witches and things and when you think about being turned into a toad or whatever, you actually get that sinking feeling in your stomach like it might actually happen. Now, I actually do happen to still believe in a lot of weird impossible things you’re supposed to stop believing in when you’re no longer a child … but not a lot of things give me that stomach feeling – the last thing to do so was the musical “Wicked” when Boq becomes the tin man. I got it tons here, and I was completely absorbed and unquestioning for the whole 2 hours. It’s actually the second movie this week (Once being the other) which I really could happily have watched all over again straight after the end credits.

Not a lot to add to my old review except to say, of course, I still love it. I get all the flaws people point out about this movie – most of all, having watched this time with two non-readers, how badly it caters to even those who have kept up on the movie side … I mean some stuff won’t make sense to you if you haven’t at least skim-read the novel – but you know what, I’m kind of blind to them. There’s an atmosphere and pace here that just takes my breath away. I was actually willing to believe on the first viewing that I’d just been blindsided by the wondrousness of Evanna Lynch as Luna Lovegood but it’s actually incredible how little screentime she has so it’s not just her. There’s the If… like departure of the Weasleys, surely the most gloriously anti-establishment moment seen in movies in years; the gloriously creepy performance of Imelda Staunton, the “I must not tell lies” scene I swear, up there and comparable to the appearance of Hannibal Lector in The Silence of the Lambs; and the one criticism of others that I have to disagree with … the death of S****s … couldn’t have been done more clearly or perfectly in my opinion.

The DVD extras are disappointing – a 45 minute doc of people asking “what does it all meeeeeeannnnn,” a patronising guide to editing and a sort of awkward “sorry we cut your part so much” thing by Nat Tena (really fun in itself, but worth a whole second disc?) – but the movie is more than worth the buy. It’s easily one of the best of the year, though I’m sure I’ll be juggling it, Azkaban, and/or movies 6 and 7 as “best in series” for as long as I live.

13th July, 2007:

Whoosh. Where to begin. As usual this is going to come out in a gush because I want what I write to be as fresh as possible and I don’t want to miss a single thing that’s buzzing around in my head. The biggest book squished into the shortest movie … and quelle movie. I have to begin by grudgingly, nay, beamingly exclaiming, this isn’t just the best in the series so far, not just as good or better than Azkaban, but I actually think maybe a freakin’ masterpiece. It hit the “as good as Azkaban, definitely, but it’ll take a second viewing to be really sure if it’s more,” point by around 30 minutes … and soon after I was simply riveted.

Again, as always, I had intended to and probably should have read the book again beforehand; I found myself realising only a few minutes in how little detail I remembered from the mammoth novel. The Sirius thing and Umbridge, of course, were cemented. But even outside of those, and boy are those lovingly (if that’s the right word for Umbridge) recreated, I felt this managed to bridge the gap insanely well between the loyalty of the Columbus movies to the novels and the joyous cinematicness of Cuaron’s marvel.

But it’s not the adaptation and general technical perfection of this one that finds me comparing it to the Cuaron movie the most … the thing that really makes this one stomp the rest of the series into the ground is the fact that the kids finally match up to the giants of the British acting world they share a screen with. Even in Azkaban I found the performances of Radcliffe and co. a little niggling. Here, even the kid playing Neville Longbottom has clearly been honing his thesp skills. Heck, even the random eyes moving around in the background of the Dumbledore’s Army scenes demand a second viewing to peruse. And the casting of Luna Lovegood? I’m sure it won’t surprise some who know me if I say, I think I have a new movie crush, lol. Evanna Lynch is absolutely wonderful, and I don’t recall that character ever really grabbing me in the books.

Add the mindblowing visual effects, the usual perfect editing and production design (the wallpaper in Sirius’ house deserves an Oscar on its lonesome), the most original score in the series since John Williams penned the till-now slightly-overly-repeated themes, a wonderful new, entirely Potterish way of doing that old cinematic cliché of the spinning news headlines, and, I don’t know … generally wonderful Potter-ness? And I’m not joking, I feel this is the series’ masterpiece. But at the same time I feel like rather than Cuaron’s outsider-ish way of stumbling upon genius in Azkaban, I feel this one is more the result of a process and this is now a perfect system that can only make the remaining two installments as good, if not better. The only thing I’d change is I’d make Tonks’ hair a little pinker, lol. Oh, and though I initially wanted Helena Bonham-Carter to play Tonks here, her performance as Bellatrix LeStrange has certainly put to bed my worries about her as Mrs Lovett later this year in Sweeney Todd.

Addendum On a sidenote … as there has been since the second movie, there will come with this movie so many reviews wasting more than a few words on how “dark” the series is getting and how it’s not for little kids anymore etc. I just wanna say, get it into your heads, people, it’s Harry Potter. It’s dark. This is a series that in the books and their adaptations has grown with its audience. If you think the fifth installment where they’re well blossomed and having first kisses and all is a great movie to take your six-year-old to and you come home incensed by what they’ve been “exposed” to … you simply don’t deserve to have that six-year-old, you idiot. It’s a PG-13 in the US, a 12A in the UK. Read the effin’ guidelines, and critics, stop making these people think they need to be told by you of all people how “dark” a movie is when it’s practically written on the frickin’ tin. It’s dark. But there’s as much love and magic in each frame of this movie (gosh, just beginning with the way the distance between Harry and everyone else is portrayed, I well up just thinking about it) as there was in part one, if not more … if you’re ready.

I get the feeling that this is always going to be one of those movies I feel like I dreamt. There were a number of details in this viewing that I have literally no recollection of seeing before, even though I was watching the exact same copy of the movie that I watched the first time. If anything, the movie is more disturbing than I grudgingly admitted in the first review; but bizarrely, at the same time, I find it even more beautiful than ever. There’s really not much more I want to say at this point, except, “Squirrel butts don’t glow!” I’d also add to the “little girl lost” themed movies I referred to in the first review as good companions for it, aside from the obvious “Alice in Wonderland” adaptations, this would also work brilliantly alongside Lawn Dogs ... I can’t believe it didn’t occur to me before.

21st November, 2006:

The reaction so far to this movie suggested to me that it was gonna be a real love-it-or-loathe-it affair, and I was almost certain which category I’d fall into, being as I love most Terry Gilliam movies, I love movies such as this, I was enthralled by the trailer, and recently wowed by the amazing Jodelle Ferland in Silent Hill and the “Dead Like Me” pilot (incidentally, funny how that featured a train crash much like the ending of this movie).

But the movie isn’t so cleancut as that and, as it ended, I found myself really not knowing what to feel. It’s an incredible piece of work, I can tell that immediately, but for now I can neither say I love it nor that I loathe it. I can’t believe I’m gonna say this … but this one actually kinda weirded me out, lol. That really takes some doing.

I love how one review I read of this movie recently said its biggest failing was Jodelle Ferland’s performance, and I think it’s a good place to start my review – if you can’t make the leap with Ferland, and I can understand there’ll be many who can’t, then you’re pretty screwed watching this movie, because it’s pretty much entirely her and entirely through her.

I didn’t think the movie would be nearly so unsettling as it is. As I said, it takes a lot to unsettle me, and this is one of the most uncomfortable movies I’ve ever seen. And if this movie’s disturbing to me, I can’t imagine how much it’s upsetting certain types of people (_cough_ Daily Mail cough) Yet, unsettling as it may be, my eyes haven’t been so glued to the screen in ages. Gilliam succeeds in showing how fantastic the crazy world Ferland occupies is through her eyes without forgetting to remind us what’s really happening. I think that’s what makes it so uncomfortable, the way it keeps sucking you in and as soon as you reach a warm place, it kinda slaps you and says “that’s sick!”

The music and photography are beautiful, and Jodelle Ferland’s performance, while not perfect, is certainly demanding and demands attention. The movie loses its way in the second half, I think, but it picks up beautifully for a haunting finish.

It’ll sit nicely alongside movies such as Paperhouse, Mirrormask, Labyrinth, and, I’m guessing, Pan’s Labyrinth (haven’t seen that yet, will do soon, but I get the impression it’s pretty similar stuff); and really, no matter what you think of it, I can’t understand how anybody could call it terrible, as the aesthetic values alone, as in any Terry Gilliam production, are worth the price of admission.

Slightly fragmented review there, sorry, but there’ll be plenty of chances to refine it on the many, I expect, repeat viewings I’ll be giving it.

There’s a nice review of the movie that just found its way into my RSS feed searches here.

Possible spoilers . . . not that any amount of info could’ve spoiled it for me, and it’s hard not to talk about the movie without talking about the ending.

I guess the first place to start on this is with the fears that come with any adaptation of a “treasured children’s classic”. I personally haven’t read the book, yes I’m ashamed, and though the title rang a bell when I first heard about the movie last year, that was barely a ring at all. But, having done a little homework online, I’d gotten the gist of the thing and had begun to fear like many long-time fans of the story, especially after viewing the trailer, that the imaginary world Leslie and Jesse create would be sort of spoiled by the full-on Weta Digital treatment – as the movie began, the sketchy animations in the opening credits were mesmerising enough for me.

The first thing to mention is how slow the movie is to actually get to Terabithia itself – but like so many things that could be seen as a bad thing in this movie, I’m quick to say, this is slow starting in the best way possible. When the visuals of the kids’ imaginary world do finally start to creep in, the movie I was most reminded was, funnily enough considering the Weta connection, a Peter Jackson film, the otherwise entirely different Heavenly Creatures – AnnaSophia Robb even sounds strangely like Kate Winslet’s Juliet as she tells Jesse, asked which desk belongs to the school bully, “It’s the one with dried up blood and dusty old bones,” – but the fantasy elements here are even more subtle than those in that movie.

That grand money shot you see in the trailer which looks like the Ewok celebration at the end of the updated Return of the Jedi is exactly that, a one-off in contrast to the rest of the movie – it’s the furthest the visuals go, it occurs right at the end of the movie, lasts barely longer than it does in the trailer, and up until then it’s even more subtle than I could have imagined. Even at that climactic point, the overindulgence makes sense to me, for at that moment we’re seeing it predominantly through the eyes of the youngest person in the movie, Jesse’s little sister; that is, the largest imagination . . . of course it’s gonna be more fantastic to a 6 year old.

Of course, doing my homework online brought one drawback, and that was getting rather large hints at the sad ending to the story. Had I not known this was coming, I think I’d have died myself, because the movie changes tone at the one hour mark so sharply and dramatically it makes last year’s Charlotte’s Web look like, well, the death of a barn-bound spider . . . Parents of very little ones should definitely be warned. Even knowing it was coming, I had tears in my eyes for the full final act. People sold on the Narnia / Lord of the Rings – like trailer will almost certainly be turned off by this emotional closing down of the movie and I worry that Disney may have really screwed up the reception this movie will get by using that shot in the trailer and generally making it look far more in your face about its fantasy than it really turns out to be. There again, maybe they’re going for the pleasant surprise angle – it certainly worked on me.

At times the movie reminded me of another personal fave, Now and Then – it has all the hallmarks of the “that special summer” type nostalgia movie and that story, too, touched on tougher themes of childhood like death and the broken family like few movies actually aimed at young people do. But then my mum mentioned My Girl. Of course. It hadn’t even occurred to me, but that’s the movie this one most resembles, again in the best way possible. In fact, the only palpable thing I can think of that separates these two movies is that rather than ride around on their bikes all day like Thomas J. and Vada, Jesse and Leslie run around in the woods in their backyard. BTW, I know that the Terabithia book came first, before someone points that out; and BTW, doesn’t matter, these two movies are equal in my mind, both absolute must-see children’s masterpieces to watch over and over, in this one’s case, in particular, whenever you feel you’re not keeping your mind wide open enough.

In the end, the movie is about every kind of young love you can imagine – there’s the crush love between Jesse and his free-spirited art-loving example of a music teacher (Zooey Deschanel made only slightly frumpy enough to pass in such a role, still cute as ever if not moreso – basically the female version of My Girl’s Mr. Bixler); the awkward familial hate-love between him and his father and his over-enthusiastic little sister; the almost primal human bond that happens between the bully and the bullied when AnnaSophia is forced to go and talk to the 8th grade giant after hearing her crying in the girls’ bathroom over her father hitting her at home; and the genuine, ill-fated love that grows between Jesse and Leslie, love that’s only ever actually spoken of – though it’s visible from the start in every frame and every glance between the pair – too late when her father tells him in the fewest words at her wake, “She loved you.”

The performances across the board – from the lead teens AnnaSophia (who to my surprise just gets better with every movie she makes, and she’s so genuine at times here it makes my heart burst) and Josh Hutcherson to Bailee Madison as the little sister to Deschanel and Robert Patrick supporting, even the bully girl at school and all the kids on the periphery – are nothing short of spectacular.

It’s gonna take a lot to beat this one for me this year, I think, especially when I get to repeat viewings on DVD. I’ll be getting the book to read ASAP, and hopefully tracking down the 1985 TV version. The one big problem? AnnaSophia’s song doesn’t get played prominently enough to get an Oscar nomination! lol It’ll be on my “Best of 2007 Part One” playlist anyway.

Wow, you’ve gotta believe I love a movie when I pull my finger out long enough to write this much about it lol.

An all-time favourite that never lets me down, yet I don’t know what to say about it. It’s the ultimate romance-gone-too-far-gone-sour movie. I don’t think Kate Winslet has ever been better; I almost want to say the same for director Peter Jackson; and Melanie Lynskey is great in everything she does. The combo of Peter Dasent’s score and Mario Lanza songs make for one of the best soundtracks, and the visual effects, while a little on the low budget side, are somehow perfect for the young girls’ fantasy world. I don’t think beautiful and disturbing have ever been so close.

Life-Size is one of those movies that turns out way, way better than its premise. A girl (Lindsay Lohan) badly longing to see her recently-deceased mother finds a rare and unusual spell-book in a weird bookshop and casts a spell to resurrect her: unfortunately, the spell is disrupted by her dad’s new girlfriend who’s trying to win his daughter over with a present, a doll… hey presto, the next morning, the doll is Tyra Banks.

Sounds awful, right? Even to a Lindsay Lohan fan it sounded pretty effing terrible. But aside from the few long scenes that don’t benefit from her presence, I really, really loved this movie, and could even see myself watching it again sometime (a good thing, I guess, since I bought the DVD instead of renting). I thought that, being a TV movie, it would somehow be a lesser performance from Lohan, but there are moments here where she’s better than ever. She plays the lonely young girl dealing with loss perfectly. Tyra Banks is a little annoying at times as the doll come to life but I really loved the character – she’s a little like Buddy in Elf, a product of fantasy harshly confronted with the real world. There are some big laughs and plenty of tears. The ending really got me, and even the corny cast dance-together didn’t bug me as much as such things usually do.

Maybe not one for most people’s DVD collections, but if you want a simple, happy feelgood movie that also lets you have a good cry, plus a great performance by Lindsay Lohan, this is definitely recommended.

I think I remember when I first watched this I said something about how overjoyed I was when I realised it would be seen by children… usually children’s movies are so simple, or striving so much to be entertaining and funny instead of enlightening. This movie is entertaining and funny, it has all the hallmarks of a children’s movie, but at the same time it serves as the most complete life lesson ever seen in animated, or possibly all, cinema. Basically it is the story of a girl who is thrown into a world where she doesn’t want to be (ain’t that all of us?), she is forced to obey the rules of the world as soon as she arrives in order to survive – if she doesn’t eat food from the world, she will literally disappear (ain’t that all of us?) and then she is forced to get a job she’s not going to like in order to prevent herself being turned into a pig like her parents (and ain’t that all of us?). Miyazaki is amazing at making the mundane fantastic.

I’ve seen the Japanese original version and something has to be said for this movie being seen in the original language – the whole philosophy just seems to fit the language, and I’ve heard that the subtitles are more accurate translations than the dub. But the English dub is definitely as good as I’d heard it was – especially Susan Egan, who is really so good it seems the role was originally written for her, it even practically looks like her. This is either talent or a freakish coincidence, I’ll take the former

Joe Hisaishi is an amazing composer, and his score here completely lifts everything, especially the Big Moment with Chihiro on the dragon’s back at the end, absolute beauty.

What child of the 80s doesn’t love this movie?

This is the first time I’ve seen the movie in widescreen, it was almost disturbing. It’s a superbit DVD too (which actually sort of annoyed me ‘cos I was expecting the DVD with the documentary on, I was hardly even interested in seeing the movie again), and the images in this movie deserve the special treatment. I hadn’t realised the movie was actually directed by Jim Henson, who is slowly becoming my late childhood god after watching Fraggles last week and now this. The messages here are clearly presented – the usual Disney-ish stuff of “you can do anything you put your heart into” etc, but also later in the movie, the rejection of material values in defense of the intangible stuff (Connelly, who in the first scene is severely overdramatic over a missing stuffed toy in her room, later refers to everything in her room as “Junk!” since the only thing she wants and needs is to find her baby brother).

Then there’s the music…. man oh man. I can’t even talk about the music. Just watch the movie or get the soundtrack. This is classic 80s, this is my childhood here lol.