Especially in cinema, children’s fantasy is a very difficult genre to correctly present itself, with a delicate balance required between purely fantastic scenes and those which portray reality. With THE SPIDERWICK CHRONICLES, director Mark Waters, who has previously done light comedies and other lesser works outside the genre, almost perfectly finds that magical blend which gives both facets the proper screen time to give each requisite weight. Like this film’s older brothers, the HARRY POTTER and NARNIA movies, the filmmaking in SPIDERWICK is superb and the visual effects are very clean, contributing to a full cinematic experience.
Here the filmmakers have carefully cast the reality sequences with children and adults who add a believable measure and provide the film with the best context for its many fantasy sequences. Unlike another superior children’s fantasy, PAN’S LABYRINTH, this film does not need to dwell on the unpleasantries of the reality moments for too long to make its points. Where the fantasy in PAN’S was remarkable, the unsettling reality overplayed its hand and went on too long. SPIDERWICK fails to make that mistake, peppering the dark circumstances of its children adequately through the story.
Certainly, in NARNIA and POTTER we have more fantastic characters than SPIDERWICK, but what the filmmakers have chosen to portray in the latter often counts more than in the former films. In SPIDERWICK we get very carefully rendered and performed brownies, goblins, ogres and trolls, and equally unforgettable sylphs, griffins, and faeries. Like PAN’s, each fantasy character in SPIDERWICK has a specific purpose and function, and they are all beautifully handled. The high water mark is an amazing ride which the children take on a summoned griffin, transporting them to an unreachable land.
Much of what makes SPIDERWICK the great film that it is rests in its ability to continually bridge the fantasy and reality with few false notes. The story is relegated to a specific goal and as such is a “smaller” film than its recent predecessors, but this only serves the tale and keeps us focused on its human plight. Young star Freddie Highmore, in his second stint sporting an American accent, and here featured as distinguished identical twins, is surely a superior actor, especially for his age, and is surely destined for great roles.
Lastly, often in recent fantasies, the question is “to CG or not to CG,” regarding the method by which to execute the complicated visual effects required by the storytelling. In PAN’S, director Guillermo del Toro decided on a blend of practical special makeup effects, animatronic characters, and computer-generated animation, to almost flawless effect. Much of the POTTER and NARNIA films, were created via CGI, but the work was mostly perfection and thereby hard to quibble with. In SPIDERWICK, there were traditional special makeup effects by Kevin (Nightmare on Elm Street’s Freddy) Yagher, and these were obviously mixed with Phil Tippett and Industrial Light and Magic’s computer-generated material. Again, convincing work is essential in fantasy, and SPIDERWICK’s artisans have largely hit it out of the park. One hopes, like the LORD OF THE RINGS films, to see a blend of multiple effects approaches to best realize fantastic realms, and that cinematic techniques do not revert to 100% computer-generated imagery.
JUMPER LANDS SPLAT
One cannot easily count the ways that JUMPER, the new action feature by Doug Liman, misses its mark.Containing a vehicle for a film but little more, JUMPER is an attempt to delve into science fiction by a director previously at home with, at their essence, enriching character studies.Not merely failing to deliver interesting characters, JUMPER also stretches more than just the limits to which an audience can suspend its disbelief.
Prior to JUMPER, Liman had directed SWINGERS, GO, THE BOURNE IDENTITY, and MR. AND MRS. SMITH, all crowd pleasing films with increasing popularity.Undeniably, those films benefited from sharp casting, clever dialogue and taut storytelling.With JUMPER, Liman switches to a story dependent on other elements, and he has not produced nearly as sure-handed an entertainment on many levels.Some of JUMPER’s visual effects are in fact remarkable, but they often become eye candy, not serving the purpose of telling the story, which is often flimsy at best.
Establishing early in the movie the concept of special individuals who are able to effortlessly teleport through space, JUMPER becomes part cat-and-mouse chase movie and part love story, but neither are strong enough to sustain themselves.We never learn exactly why the titular teleporting jumpers are being chased, though we are intrigued by the concept of a centuries-old battle with another entity. In the present day, this renegade group is led by a blond Samuel L. Jackson, who sadly often has little to do or say besides pursuing the two jumper heroes of the tale, both familiar faces to genre fans: Hayden Christensen from the newest STAR WARS trilogy, and Jamie Bell from the recent KING KONG.
Early on, we have middling sympathies for Christensen’s plight as he seems nothing more than a silver spoon jumper with no real ambitions or arc we can side with.At one point, he suggests to Jackson that he is different from most jumpers, but we never see or hear why.Maybe that information is being saved for JUMPER 2.Bell delivers more charisma than the bland Christensen, but even his character doesn’t seem to have a worthy plight.In the midst of their interplay is the presence of a requisite beauty played by the amiable Rachel Bilson, but she has little to do except be duped by Christensen until she finally smells that there is something unusual going on.Insufferably, Bilson is awarded with some of the more stilted genre dialogue in recent memory.
All of this misconstruing of the material is somewhat surprising given Liman’s delivery of generally good entertainments and reliable writer David S. Goyer’s participation in the screenplay.One wonders what happened from the green light to the screen that resulted in a sloppy and bewildering film that must have started somewhere as a cool idea.Perhaps after this, Liman will jump back to projects that at least offer more involving characters.
Scott Essman
VISIONARY MEDIA
scottessman@yahoo.com
P.O. Box 1722 Glendora, CA 91740
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SPIDERWICK CHRONICLES 
