Movie Reaction: Christopher Robin

Formula: (Finding Neverland + Pete's Dragon) / Goodbye Christopher Robin

A while back, I toyed with the idea of movies that make you appreciate another movie even more. The idea is that there are two movies about the same basic thing, but one is bad and one is good. Watching the bad movie gets you to realize how much more impressive the decisions made for the good movie are. I believe it was Lock Up vs. The Shawshank Redemption that prompted this. Both films are about a wronged guy trying to survive his prison sentence. One is a classic. The other is not.

Well, now it's time for a cousin of that idea: films that spoil other films.

The most common form of this is when two movies come out at the same time with the exact same idea. Dante's Peak and Volcano. Deep Impact and Armageddon. This Is the End and The World's End. K-9 and Turner & Hooch. Often, either the first film spoils the excitement for the second, or the second makes needed tweaks to find success that the first couldn't. Most recently, Disney's The Jungle Book was so well received that it forced Warner Brothers to sell their upcoming Mowgli off to Netflix.

The case of Christopher Robin is a little different. Last year, I saw Goodbye Christopher Robin, a film based on the real Christopher Robin - author A.A. Milne's son - and how Winnie the Pooh ruined his childhood. Seeing that movie has poisoned every bit of buildup I've seen for this new Christopher Robin movie from Disney. It's made me very hesitant about seeing the movie.

Christopher Robin is a completely fictional movie about the Christopher Robin character (Ewan McGregor). In this, young Christopher is forced to leave the hundred acre woods to go to boarding school. In the decades that follow, he becomes a serious businessman, working hard but joylessly to provide for his wife (Hayley Atwell) and daughter (Bronte Carmichael). After skipping out on yet another family vacation because of a pressing work matter, Christopher gets a visit from Winnie the Pooh as a result of something between chance and fate. Christopher soon reunites with all the other characters from the hundred acre woods and rediscovers what's important in life. Even more than most movies, I'm not worried about spoiling the plot of this movie, because the plot is exactly the thing you expect it will be.

This movie is charming in nearly every way. Ewan McGregor plays his emotions earnestly. I'm pretty sure the entire audition process for the film was him saying "silly old bear". The movie is intended to be accessible to young children, so none of the characters are terribly complex. Atwell is a disappointed wife (not to be confused with a disapproving wife). She could've been used more. Bronte Carmichael just wants to spend time with her dad. There isn't much more to her than that, and that's all the film needs. Most of the charm comes from the hundred acre woods characters. They are all exactly as you remember them. Pooh is sort of a lazy idiot-savant. Piglet is nervous. Tigger is animated and bouncy. Eeyore is despondent. The movie plays just enough with the known characteristics without pandering to them.

I'm not sure how I feel about the animation of the animals. They opts to keep them as stuffed animals. I'm so used to the animated series, that this threw me at first. Before long, I got used to it though. There is something slower and more deliberate about them as stuffed animals. They feel real, even if the animation isn't always perfect.

After a decade of making bigger blockbuster types of movies that I haven't cared for much (World War Z, Quantum of Solace), with Christopher Robin, director Marc Forster returns to the more fanciful, smaller films like Stranger Than Fiction and Finding Neverland that he made his name on. And you can see bits of each of those films in Christopher Robin. The Finding Neverland connection is obvious, taking a human look at a beloved children's story. The Stranger Than Fiction comparison is in the way that he mixes the fundamentally absurd with the mundane. Christopher Robin doesn't get to bogged down with the details. I don't know why Pooh and his friends exist or what their existence means about the "real" world. I just know that they help to tell Christopher's story. In my own lexicon, they are the One Big Leap that allows there to be a story.

Ultimately, Goodbye Christopher Robin didn't ruin this movie for me. It was more of a gnawing feeling and that's about it. Christopher Robin is an oddly paced movie. It goes for small laughs more than big ones. It has a lot of heart and a thin plot. To quote the little girl sitting in front of me talking to her dad in the theater: "Not a lot happened, but I still liked it. It wasn't very exciting, but I still liked it." I hope Disney keeps up with these quiet, late summer family movies like Pete's Dragon and Christopher Robin. They are a much gentler way for Disney to make movies that are still on brand.

Movie Theater MVP: This goes to the man in the back of the theater with the bellowing laugh, who thought nearly every joke in the movie was hilarious. I love being in a theater with someone who is the target audience, delighting in everything the movie has to offer. This guy loved what he was watching. He wasn't obnoxious about it. He just had a strong laugh and didn't care to hide it. The theater even started taking cues from him. It was great.

Verdict (?): Weakly Recommend