Congratulations, Disney. You ruined Winnie the Pooh. No, no. Please stand. Take a bow. Make a speech. Do tell us how the endless quest for a dollar came up with a Pooh movie destined to turn off children, the very children who love animated Pooh bear. Go right ahead. The platform is yours. The platform is always yours.
First off, don’t be fooled by the grandiose imdb rating. As I’ve discussed in many reviews of late, there is little more suspect these days than “consensus” imdb; current imdb ratings amount to little more than stuffing the ballot box for your particular agenda. Christopher Robin may not be a bottom ten film, but it’s so far below the top tier that one can successfully argue, “Why was this film made?” Disney, who so often has a built-in audience for whatever it produces, never seemed to ask itself, “Who is this movie for?” because I’ve thought long and hard about the answer to that question and have not come to a reasonable conclusion.
Christopher Robin (Ewan McGregor), clearly the most beloved member of the 100 Acre stable, has grown up to become a cliché. A tired cliché. This particular cliché is the caring father who has no time for wife or daughter. For a man who played with Winnie the Pooh daily in his own youth, he hasn’t a clue as to the dreams and desires of his own child. That seems a tad fabricated, but we’ll let it slide off like Eeyore’s tail. As an efficiency manager for a post-war London suitcase company, Christopher has the unwelcome burden of packing 20% more room in the budget by Monday. Looks like he won’t make that family trip to his childhood home in Sussex after all. I know mood is important to establish, but there isn’t a Pooh-loving small child on this planet who would stomach without complaint the dreary dull scenes in which only humans are on screen. What Disney was thinking here is quite beyond my comprehension.
As Christopher can’t go to the fun, the fun comes to him. While ducking a gin rummy appointment, CR (Chris Rock? Colorado Rockies?) finds a park bench across from his London flat at which time his decades-old stuffed bear companion Winnie the Pooh emerges from a tree and starts up a conversation. Is Christopher going crazy? No, the stuffed animal can clearly walk and talk. And instead of wonder and amusement and wistful joy, Christopher Robin spends the next half hour of screen time trying to get rid of Winnie the Pooh. Seriously. I don’t really care where the picture went from this point. If you are making a film for children and you have your title character confronted by his own magical childhood, literally, and all you can think to have him do is stuff it back in the sack where it came from –for a full half-hour or more on screen, mind you- I’m not sure you understand what it is to make a film for children.
In my mind, the easiest and most obvious comparison to Christopher Robin is Steven Spielberg’s 1991 swing-and-a-miss Hook, another film in which the grown up version of a childhood icon takes FOREVER to find the fun. Given the distinct and common failures of Christopher Robin, I would have guessed that the director was, perhaps, not aware of the milieu of Peter Pan. However, Marc Forster made his name with his 2004 Oscar nominated film Finding Neverland, the biopic of J.M. Barrie. At this point, I’m kinda speechless. Why would you make a film similar to, and sucking in the exact same ways as, Hook?
There’s a Toy Story-like sadness to Christopher Robin; his childhood playmates have, apparently lived their lives alone for decades in the 100 Acre wood without their boy. Is this how you want to picture your own childhood toys? That they don’t grow up, but just get sadder and lonelier waiting for you to become a child again? Sorry, Tigger, it’s not gonna happen. There is indeed some fun in the story once the stuffed toys start interacting to life, especially life in London, but we already have a movie for that – two in fact, and they’re both much better. If you need “toys come to life, London edition,” check out Paddington and Paddington II: Electric Bear-galoo. As for Christopher Robin, I’m bringing this full circle: who is this film for? The target audience of Pooh-loving children will beg you to FF to the paucity of “good stuff.” Children old enough to sit through the pain are probably a little too old to feel unconditional love for the 100 Acre crew. How about nostalgic adults indulging their inner child? Well, that would be people like me, and personally, I’m horrified to see what the adult Christopher Robin has become.
♪Deep in the 100 Acre wood
Where Christopher Robin strayed
You’ll find an assortment of cast-off rubes
Who feel like they’ve all been played
Winnie the Pooh, Piglet and Roo
Ratty, musty, dirty forgotten tools
Yeah Winnie the Pooh, that donkey guy, too
Abandonment’s the way that I care ♫
Rated PG, 104 Minutes
Director: Marc Forster
Writer: Alex Ross Perry and Tom McCarthy and Allison Schroeder
Genre: Ruining your childhood
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: I honestly don’t know. I’d be willing to bet a large amount of money that the majority of “10”s on imdb belong to Disney employees encouraged to play it up. I honestly believe those familiar with the Pooh milieu will be very disappointed with the tone of this picture.
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Gotta go with me on this one, just in case I’m the lone voice screaming the emperor has no clothes.
♪ Parody Inspired by “Winnie the Pooh”
