However, Lowery's take makes sense in this context. And here, Hook is her contrast.Īdmittedly, I prefer my Captain Hook with the gentleman pirate bravado seen in the animated version, or Dustin Hoffman's drama queen from Hook, or Jason Isaacs in P.J. As the film is about Wendy growing and changing - whether she wants to or not - this elementary shift in character works well enough. She wears pants, fights instead of flees, and gets to play the hero on par with her titular cohort. Lowery's version of Wendy is given a girl-power polish in the vein of the live-action Beauty and the Beast, which is to say earnestly yet clumsily in the Strong Female Character mold. Ingenue Ever Anderson has the vibe of a young Keira Knightley, her gaze steady, her lip trembling as she regards a ruthless world of cannonball fire, swordplay, and the battling egos of Pan and Hook. Indeed, the most riveting scenes are those between Wendy and Hook, untangling their thoughts on Peter and their trauma around their far-off mothers. While Wendy is initially in awe of his ability to fly and fight and crow, she soon sees he's more braggart than noble hero, stealing credit and perverting stories to suit his narrative.
#Madcap flare movie#
Incredibly, this Disney movie dares to consider- albeit briefly - that Peter Pan may actually be a little jerk. Departing from the Disney lore (and perhaps borrowing from Christina Henry's excellent fantasy novel Lost Boy: The True Story of Captain Hook), Lowery and Halbrooks bestow their Hook with a tragic backstory of lost love, abandonment, and regret that mingles with his quest for vengeance.
Peter Pan & Wendy toys with its hero and villains.ĭespite its title, the emotional core of Peter & Wendy is James Hook. It's not until the second act that the film begins to feel like his, pushing at emotional complexity. Lowery's imagination and flare for the fantastical feels hemmed in by a checklist of iconography - a shadow, a thimble, a hook - and plot points.
While fans of the 1953 version may perk up at callbacks in costuming and score, they might well be bored by how rote the film's first hour is. Even the pirates are a wash of beige and grey. Part of the problem is a color palette that is tinged a sickly green, making the whole film feel as if you're peering through an abandoned soda bottle. While the beats are familiar, they're lacking in fun. There, they'll meet the Lost Boys, Princess Tiger Lily (Alyssa Wapanatâhk), and a band of kid-hating pirates led by James Hook (Law). Lucky for her, Peter Pan (Alexander Molony) appears in her nursery and - with the help of Tinker Bell (Yara Shahidi) - he'll whisk her and her young brothers John (Joshua Pickering) and Michael (Jacobi Jupe) away to Neverland. The first act is the same as it ever was: Wendy Moira Angela Darling (Ever Anderson) is a girl on the brink of growing up, and as she rants to her mother (a beautiful but all-too-brief Molly Parker), she doesn't want things to change. Barrie's story is tonally chaotic, veering between the kind of theatrical performance you'd expect on a stage (perhaps of a middle school), the snarling intensity of a teen drama, and the gruff, madcap style that is Jude Law's take on Captain Hook. Their previous collaboration managed to combine the whimsy of older Disney animated features - including the studio's classic 1953 Peter Pan - with an earthy humanity. Lowery co-wrote the Peter Pan & Wendy screenplay with Toby Halbrooks, a frequent collaborator who also shares screenwriting credits on Lowery's wonderful Disney live-action remake Pete's Dragon (2016). Peter Pan & Wendy delivers a shallow reinterpretation. Peter Pan & Wendy is astounding only in that it's so wildly different from Lowery's last film, and in the worst ways possible. The Green Knight was willfully slow and pondering, urging the audience into an odyssey of ambiguity, texture, atmosphere, and yearning. When detractors decry Disney for cannibalizing IP for profit, they could point to Peter Pan & Wendy, a live-action recreation of a classic movie that mercilessly bleeds life out of its iconic characters and passion out of its heralded helmer.īefore the limp atrocity of this CGI-laden remake, writer/director David Lowery adapted the story of Sir Gawain into a rapturously gorgeous, mind-bendingly surreal, unapologetically lusty, and hauntingly poetic film.
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