X-Men movies are getting weirder. What? This isn’t an X-Men film? You’re joking, right? Of course it is. Kids with other-worldly attributes, remote anachronistic school where nothing is taught, and eventually there’s a big fight with supernatural beings. That’s an X-Men film, that is.
What’s that? “It’s a Tim Burton.” Ok, well, sure it’s got some good Tim Burton elements, like gleeful eyeball consumption and faceless gigantic spike-legged baddies … but if this is a Tim Burton film, where’s the dour, eh? Where’s the super creepy atmosphere? Where’s Johnny Depp? Where’s Helena Bonham Carter? C’mon. You’re not fooling anyone.
I guess that about sums it up for me. Miss Peregrin’s Home for Peculiar Children feels like Tim Burton’s attempt at X-Men. Everyteen Jake (Asa Butterfield) comes to the rescue of his (senile?) Florida grandfather (Terence Stamp). Too late. When Jake gets there, he finds eyeless gramps lying outside in the swampland and a big tentacle monster in the background. This is Florida, so one might attribute such to polling place confusion or an FSU football crowd getting out-of-hand, but Jake suspects there’s more to it. Creepy gramps urges Jake to “find the loop.”
The loop turns out to be a loop in time, specifically contained in a remote section of a tiny island in Wales called Cairnholm. Check it out, here’s all of grampa’s nutty childhood pals, the invisible boy, the floating girl, the, uh, guy who likes to play God of Fight Club with rock ‘em sock ‘em baby dolls, the twin kids who wear Halloween costumes 24/7 … and such. The crossbow toting Miss Peregrine (Eva Green) runs this exotic day care. Yes, she does shapeshift into a falcon which in this world is cool but fairly useless. Now this is the key part – she resets the clock at 9:05 every night during a Nazi air raid. She cuts it pretty damn close if you ask me, but this is what she does right before the bomb that will destroy their habitat connects. That way it stays September 3, 1943 forever, which is awesome if you want to live every day of several lifetimes as an awkward child in a Welsh prison. Every day to these poor saps is a reset of 9/3/43 while the locals live on in real time.
So lemme see if I got this right: kid sees a tragedy in the present. While investigating, he discovers a portal to the past where ultimately he can go to correct the tragedy of the present, which would render his present-world necessity to investigate irrelevant. Is that correct? Wouldn’t that behavior create the same present-day tragedy anew? Wouldn’t the kid keep re-living the same on-again, off-again set of time loops? I gotta say, sometimes I really don’t understand time travel.
And you want to know the truth? The time travel is a red herring. So is white-eyed Samuel L. Jackson. Oh, he’s real and scary and
must be defeated all right, but this film is a romance in horror/fantasy clothing. Jake is hot for floating girl, Emma (Ella Purnell), the same girl his gramps was hot for when he was her age. Ok, that’s weird and more than a little disturbing. See: Age of Adaline, The. Would you want to date a girl who defies gravity? What would the advantages be? Get into outdoor concerts and sporting events free, I suppose. Alcohol goes right to her head, sure (hmmm, is that good or bad?). If you forget where you parked, she’s probably great at finding the car. OTOH, she’s probably not terribly impressed by carnival thrill rides. She literally can’t keep anything down and jerks will constantly taunt her with jibes like, “do your legs go all the way up?” Everything in life is give and take.
In 1941, we got the Maltese Falcon. 1977 introduced us to the Millennium Falcon. Now in 2016, there is Miss Peregrine (Falcon). The way I see it is we have about 40 years from now to introduce another falcon into cinematic lore. Any bets?
I’ve got a power, what can it be?
I can grow a superfluous knee
Can bounce an extra baby if needed
Make sure all my skins get treated
Outstanding!
I’ve got a power, what can it be?
I can grow leaves just like a tree
In fall I shed my skin like a sheet
Take in water using my feet
Incredible!
I’ve got a power, what can it be?
I can see into 5:23
I can tell if the sun’s up or down
I can tell if “cat” is a noun
Amazing!
Rated PG-13, 127 Minutes
D: Tim Burton
W: Jane Goldman
Genre: L’il X-Men
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: Tweener coeds
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: “Look, I just want a mature story about kids that isn’t a cartoon and nobody has magic powers; is that freaking too much to ask?!”
