Rating summary
Movie | | 3.5 |
Video | | 4.5 |
Audio | | 4.5 |
Extras | | 2.5 |
Overall | | 4.0 |
Neverland Blu-ray Movie Review
Everything but the kitchen Tink.
Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman February 25, 2012
Syfy evidently can’t be content with revising its own name, one of the most patently silly rebrandings in the history of
cable television. For the past several years, Syfy has developed its own niche, revisiting iconic stories of yore and
remaking them in its own, supposedly science fiction, image. The fact is, Syfy has veered rather far from “pure” science
fiction, branching out into fare as far afield from H.G. Wells and Ray Bradbury as reality television competitions (albeit
with
a quasi-scifi twist, having been built around special effects and makeup artists). Syfy’s collaborations with writer-
director
Nick Willing and producers Robert Halmi, Sr. and Jr., offer another example of fare that is probably not traditionally
science
fiction, but which has still found a home on the network and in at least a couple of instances has generated huge
viewership. Starting with Tin Man in 2007, Willing took on one of the most beloved tales of all time, L. Frank
Baum’s The Wizard of Oz, and gave it a post-modern twist that reinvented several characters a la the
somewhat
similar (in concept if not effect) Wicked. Two years later Willing was back with the considerably less successful
Alice, a reworking of the iconic works of Lewis Carroll. 2011 saw the debut of Neverland, Willing’s
attempt
to reimagine Sir James Matthew Barrie’s immortal (pun intended) creation Peter Pan. Of course Peter has been fodder
for all sorts
of
adaptations through the years, and none other than Steven Spielberg attempted his own take on the tale years ago
with
Hook (ironically, that film’s Smee, Bob Hoskins, recreates his role for this miniseries). And though Hook
was a sequel of sorts and Neverland is a prequel of sorts, that doesn't necessarily set it apart from the
scads of other Peter Pan adaptations: none other than humorist Dave Barry wrote a series of Peter Pan prequels
under the catchall title of Peter and the Starcatchers. (Disney has optioned the series for film, and is reportedly
working on at least one 3D animated version.)
Willing seems drawn to source novels or stories that offer a “stranger in a strange land,” strange lands which Willing
tends to reinvent as a stray planet or alternate universe. He’s up to his old tricks again in
Neverland, though he
gets there by a rather circuitous route that sees him drawing on a number of contemporary pop culture references,
including films as disparate as the
Pirates of the Caribbean series,
Avatar, the Guy Ritchie
Sherlock
Holmes reboots,
Oliver Twist, and, just for good measure, a dash of
Harry Potter. In this version,
Peter
(Charlie Rowe) is initially a 1906 London lad who might be thought of as a “modern day” Oliver Twist, part of a roving
gang
of parentless boys who thieve under the mentorship of their own Fagin, one Jimmy Hook (Rhys Ifans). A brief prologue
to
the Pan/Hook arc is actually cast several hundred years previously, as a group of pirates, improbably led by a woman
named Elizabeth Bonny (Anna Friel) take down a British ship and bring aboard some booty, which includes a weird
glowing
orb (kind of like a magical snow globe). When Bonny doesn’t like what she sees, she fires a gun at it, at which point a
huge explosion of light ensues and the pirate ship and its inhabitants are sucked into some kind of void and disappear
from view. Care to guess where they’ve ended up?
Back in London, Jimmy seems to be attempting to reintroduce himself to London high society, a class from which he has
evidently fallen from grace. He’s being helped by a shadowy figure who seems to be involved in some sort of occult
organization (replete with
Holmes-esque secret meetings and cowls). Jimmy doesn’t tell Peter what’s going on,
only that they need to rob a nearby antiques store, and it’s there that Jimmy finds (guess what?)—the long lost orb
seen in the pirate prologue. Jimmy’s a klutz, though, and drops the globe, which once again emits a massive light and
sucks Jimmy and all of the other boys save Peter into its gaping maw. Peter attempts to figure out what’s going on by
shadowing Jimmy’s cowled mentor, but ends up figuring out
he needs to tap the globe to be sucked into it
himself, something he decides will help him ultimately be able to rescue his comrades. And so, finally, more than a half
hour into this nearly three hour enterprise, we get all of our major characters in Neverland, which in true Willing fashion
is not the fantasy world of childhood, but an actual physical place, a planet that due to a space-time anomaly, is a place
where nothing and no one ages.
The rest of
Neverland plays out with a variety of interlocking subplots. Jimmy falls for Elizabeth and they both
decide they need to get their hands on some magical minerals that allow the fairies like Tinkerbell (voiced by Keira
Knightley, herself a woman pirate in
Pirates of the Caribbean) to fly. That sets the pirates off to raid the fairy
homeland in a more or less direct allusion to the environmentally themed
Avatar (and note the similarity of the
fairies’ glowing region to a certain holy site in the Cameron film). In the meantime, Peter goes through one tribulation
after another, trials that become increasingly interminable as this miniseries wends its way toward its conclusion. He
and his “crew” (the other boys) make contact with a tribe of Indians who live in one of Neverland’s regions, and that of
course allows Peter to meet Tiger Lily (Q’orianka Kilcher). Peter’s adventures ultimately lead him to figuring out what’s
going on with the magical orb and how he might be able to return to London. That brings him into conflict with Jimmy
and the pirates by the end of Part 1 of the miniseries, a conflict which ends with Peter being seriously injured. That in
turn leads Tinkerbell to aid in healing him, which then leads to Peter being imbued with the magical minerals that allow
him to fly (among other “special powers”).
Neverland is certainly head and shoulders above Willing’s
Alice, an attempt which completely missed the
ebullient spirit of Carroll and instead descended into a weirdly anachronistic Gothic feeling a lot of the time. While this
redo of Barrie certainly isn’t the childlike fairy tale the original is, it manages to incorporate enough interesting new
material to hold interest, even if there’s
way too much plot for the flimsy premise to support. This is a miniseries
that has everything but the kitchen sink, and while that keeps things “busy”, it’s not always to the miniseries’ benefit.
Neverland probably would have played
much better had it simply been a two hour made for television
movie. As it stands, it feels awfully padded at times, especially as Peter undergoes one trauma after another, many of
which never add anything to the plot or character development.
This is another outing that is full of green screen material, and as such it has the slightly hazy, surreal look of the two
other Willing enterprises. That actually works to
Neverland’s otherworldly benefit, and a lot of this film manages
to evoke both charm and terror, two things that were certainly part and parcel of Barrie’s original conception. The
performances are generally adequate, with Ifans doing okay work trying to remake Hook as a brooding, put upon soul
with “Method” interior conflicts. Rowe emotes a little too much for his own good in several key sequences, but makes
for a winning Peter overall. Kilcher appears to have been dubbed (or at least post-looped), and not very artfully at
that, something which detracts and distracts from her appealing presence.
Neverland Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality
Neverland is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of RHI Entertainment and Vivendi Entertainment with a VC-1 encoded 1080p transfer in
1.78:1. This is a very nice looking high definition presentation, if one takes into account the glut of green screen footage, which lends large
swaths of Neverland a hazy, soft and sort of surreal looking ambience. The CGI textures are often gauzy and while colors are bold,
bright and incredibly well saturated, it can't be stated that there's a wealth of fine detail in most of the animation. The live action elements look
quite nicely sharp, clear and very well defined, and close-ups reveal a wealth of pleasing fine detail. If you've seen Tin Man or
Alice, you know exactly what to expect from this Blu-ray, as Neverland falls into more or less the same category.
Neverland Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality
Neverland's lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 audio mix is really quite impressive, given the television roots of this outing. Immersion is
quite consistent, with some very nice ambient environmental effects nicely dotting the surrounds and achieving an evocative aural sense of what
Neverland is like. Several sequences feature some very nice panning effects as, for example, Tinkerbell flits from place to place. The mix is also
quite frequently awash in some very impressive and bombastic LFE, with everything from cannon fire to the sonic "boom" when the orb emits its
light roaring out of the subwoofer. Fidelity is very strong throughout, with dialogue cleanly and clearly presented. One slight problem, as noted
above in the main body of the review, is with Kilcher's dialogue. It sounds like the actress was either dubbed or post-looped, and rather badly
at that.
Neverland Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras
- Audio Commentary By Writer-Director Nick Willing. Willing makes for a quite congenial commentator, talking about his
methods in adapting and "scifi"-ing the story. He also gets into some of the technical issues in terms of the glut of green screen material
here. This commentary is anecdotal at times, but enjoyable.
- The Story Behind the Story: Cast Interviews (HD; 15:35) features segments with Rhys Ifans, Anna Friel,
Charlie Rowe and Bob Hoskins. Almost all of these are simple one or two sentence to answers that are presented as
textual interstitials.
- Green Screen to Scene (HD; 3:45) focuses on the CGI heavy special effects, and includes segments on The
Alchemist's Orb, Discovering Dr. Fludd, Chased by Pirates, and Battle on Bull Island. Green screen filming is shown in a sort
of split screen (actually the two screens overlap just slightly) next to finished footage. That said, what is shown on the
green screen footage rarely matches exactly what's being shown in the final footage, in terms of angles and shots.
- Journey into Neverland: Art Gallery includes storyboards and production design sketches.
- Neverland: Access All Areas (HD; 22:23) is a nice looking behind the scenes featurette that, judging by the
British narrator, probably aired on Sky TV.
- Trailer (1080i; 2:13)
Neverland Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation
If you're a fan of Tin Man or Alice, you'll find a lot to like in Neverland. Willing has his formula down pat now, and in some
ways, Neverland is the best of the three reworkings Willing and Syfy have presented to an often adoring public. The miniseries still has
too many twists and turns for its own good, and it's too long by at least an hour. But the production design is quite good, performances are
enjoyable and there are enough new elements introduced here to hold viewer interest, at least most of the time. With great looking visuals and
audio and a nice supply of supplementary material, Neverland comes Recommended.