That's A Wrinkle in Time in a nutshell. I figured I'd start with a summary, because I wasn't sure how else to begin this. The film is based on a classic book that, despite being made into a film once before, has been called unfilmable. It will surprise no one who follows this blog that I haven't reads the book. However, based on the movie I just watched, I can see where this unfilmable talk came from. My initial take is that A Wrinkle in Time is a remarkable misfire, emphasis on remarkable.
There's is a lot to love about this movie. I saw it for the cast. Any time Oprah agrees to do a movie, it's worth looking into. If I was casting a trio of godlike beings who give guidance to a protagonist, she makes the most sense to play the leader. She gives the film an authority that it needs. Reese Witherspoon is very charming throughout in a very Reese Witherspoon way. Mindy Kaling is underutilized but good when she's used. Storm Reid is a terrific young talent. This film needs a strong young performer at the center of it and she was up to the challenge. The film (or any film) is lucky to get performers like Chris Pine and Gugu Mbatha-Raw for pretty minor roles. I love the message of the movie a great deal. It's all about finding your self-worth and celebrating what makes you unique. What's not to like about that? It challenges some of the more familiar beats of an adventure movie by not always going in a direction I expected. I was rooting for this movie, and if I squint and tilt my head the right way, it looks like a movie I could fall hard for.
It just didn't come together. It's a story that was written in abstract nouns. The three guides are named after questions (Who, Which, Whatsit). They seek guidance from a character known as the Happy Medium (played by Zach Galifianakis). The villain is known as "It" and it's from "the dark thing". And I can see how this kind of deconstruction of concepts could work, but I never understood the rules of this world. I kept waiting for the moment when everything came together in a clever way that made sense, and that never came. Perhaps it's in the book. I got very tired of how little trust the movie had in its audience. There was way more telling than showing in the film. I got really tired of the number of scenes in which someone had to stop to tell Meg how special she is. If you can't make that clear through her actions, then the film has failed. And, the plot in this movie just sort of happens. It's never clear how Meg's younger brother seems to already know everything that's going on. Calvin literally shows up out of nowhere and says he got the urge to be there at that time on a whim (Note: that is sort of explained later). The challenges they face in the dark thing don't make any sense to me. There's a big tornado for some reason with a wall. There's a fake creepy neighborhood with many kinds of cakes and roasted food then a crowded beach with a bizarre performance from Michael Pena. Meg's able to essentially imagine her way to save her dad. The story has a baffling number of plot holes. It feels like somewhere there's a three and a half hour cut of this movie that makes perfect sense that was lost in editing.
I'm hesitant to completely dismiss this movie though for one big reason: a lot of my issues with this could also be said about Tomorrowland, which is a movie I love. Tomorrowland has a protagonist who everyone says is special repeatedly. It's about a bunch of ideas rather than specifics. That movie has way more story to it than it can fit into the movie, filled with detours that lead nowhere. It also celebrates science and people who try to do remarkable things. And it wasn't until the second time that I saw Tomorrowland before everything clicked. I'm leaving the door open for me to change my mind about A Wrinkle in Time too. My first instinct when I love the message of a movie but can't sort out my other issues with it is to assume that I'm in the wrong and missing something. As it stands though, I didn't buy into the world of A Wrinkle in Time, the story was way to sloppy, and the characters weren't driving the narrative. I get the feeling I'd love the book.
Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend
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