★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆
It’s all surface and no substance in this high-flying but
heavy-handed prequel to the Peter Pan story, featuring characters ‘introduced
by’ J.M. Barrie…no, really, that’s how the original author who created these
marvellous stories is referred to in a two second snippet of the closing
credits.
Stop me if you’ve heard this one: a young boy – subject of
an ancient prophecy – is whisked away to a new world in order to defeat great
evil while making his mother Mary (subtle, I know) proud. Peter (newcomer Levi Miller)
is snatched from a dingy workhouse (itself snatched from Oliver Twist) by a
band of pirates led by the dreaded Blackbeard (a hammy Hugh Jackman) and taken
to Neverland. In the depths of Blackbeard’s fairy dust mines, Peter crosses
paths with a young James Hook (Garett Hedlund), and the stage is set for all our characters to tread their first steps towards the story we all know
and love.
Obviously, any element of realism goes rogue once a flying
pirate ship drops from the heavens, but movies need their own internal logic,
so can someone explain to me how Blackbeard is able to stand before his minions
to deliver a rousing chorus of Nirvana’s ‘Smells like Teen Spirit’ during World
War 2? And while we’re on the subject of logic, Rooney Mara’s role as Tiger
Lily (the lone white woman in a forest tribe entirely populated by people of
various Asian descents) makes even less sense.
I think I’d be more annoyed with the whitewashing if the
characters themselves weren’t so irritating: Hedlund has clearly let the swathe
of internet comments recommending him as a young Han Solo go to his head,
spending the whole film attempting to balance a gravelly Harrison Ford voice
with the light-footed movement of a comedy sidekick but tumbles from the
tightrope in ear-splitting fashion. Jackman brings some much needed swagger to
Blackbeard and is clearly having a complete riot, while Levi Miller shows signs of promise
that even a faux-cockney accent can’t smother.
Neverland itself is brought to life through the usual
whizz-bang CGI magic, but the animation of human characters during all the stunt
work are hired in force from the uncanny valley (the digital double of Miller
bearing the appearance of an entirely different actor). All the real-life
stunts are bouncy enough to give the kids a nice laugh and the Never Birds are genuinely
frightening, but proper thrills are thin on the ground.
What visual treats remain are but the velvet tissue paper in
which this visibly stale slice has been wrapped: no amount of fairy dust can
bring back the taste of the original, fulfilling and slightly less sickly cake.
