Once more, we find the second star to the right and sail on till morning in the latest screen incarnation of J.M. Barrie’s beloved characters in Pan. A prequel tale of the time before boy who wouldn’t grow up became the Pan, we follow young Peter’s journey from World War II era London to the pirate-run magical realm of Canada Neverland.
So, is it any good?
The origin story is a tricky one to pull off; change too much of the characters or alter the timeline of events too much and you risk alienating the fan base that you’re trying to cater for, but if you go the other way and don’t rock the boat enough, delivering exactly what people expect, then they’ll wonder “why was this movie made?”. Pan sits between these two camps, launching us into a movie world that is not always what you’d expect, but that will also beg the question “why bother?”.
It’s starts promisingly enough in the prologue. A very acrobatic young woman leaves her bouncy baby boy on the steps of an orphanage with a note and a pan flute medallion. Flash forward 12 years later, and said boy is Peter, a roguish troublemaker still in the orphanage, having to contend with the gruesome head nun. When he notices other boys are going missing, he find evidence that she’s selling the boys to pirates as slave labour. Faster than you can say “I believe in fairies”, Peter finds himself part of the next recruitment drive, pulled into the sky by cirque-du-so-pirates and whisked away on a flying galleon. After an all-too-brief dogfight between the ships and Nazi bombers, we sail on towards Neverland and the magic begins… or doesn’t in this case.
Once in Neverland, Peter is put to work in the Pixum (the mineral name for fairy dust) mines of Captain Blackbeard (Hugh Jackman), who uses the stuff to keep himself youthful. Peter soon finds himself on Blackbeard’s bad side, which would normally spell the end, but surprise surprise, Peter can fly. This definitely piques Blackbeard’s interest, who tells Peter of the age old prophecy of his downfall at the hands of a boy who can fly. Peter’s antics also catch the eye of fellow miner James Hook (Garett Hedlund), still with both hands intact, who hatches a plan to escape with the boy and his off-sider Smee (Adeel Akhtar). After a death and gravity defying escape (one of the films best sequences), the three unlikely travellers go on the run to find the native tribe of Neverland, find out more about Peter’s past, and maybe find a way to take down Blackbeard. Throw in some Muay Thai trained natives, mermaids, fairies, and one big ass crocodile and you’ve just about got the gist of things.
This should be a slam-dunk by all accounts, beloved characters, shit-hot director (that’d be Joe Wright of Atonement and Hanna fame) and a marquee star that has shown he has the goods. Before I tear holes in the main sail, first the good things. The movie looks amazing, and if you are going to see it, I suggest that you go to a 2D session as the 3D doesn’t really add anything and tends to muddy the beautiful images a bit. The practical sets are pretty well done and Wright certainly knows where to put his camera. There are also a couple of really effective action sequences, including the aforementioned mine escape and a trampoline-set rumble. Our main man Peter is ably played by young Aussie newcomer Levi Miller, and he more than holds his own against his movie star counterparts, showing great promise for his career. There are also two gorgeously animated sequences in the movie that use trees and water to tell the story of Neverland’s past, which bring to mind a similarly outstanding sequence in Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part 1.
So what went wrong?
Firstly, I’m just not sure that Peter Pan is a character that requires an origin story. His character story and motivations all seemed pretty straight-forward really, and here Jason Fuchs’ script ties it all up with a stock-standard “chosen one” narrative which doesn’t really add much, and pretty much telegraphs all the beats along the way. Next is the acting, which varies wildly in tone. Miller impresses as the puckish Peter, but Jackman (although watchable) seems stuck in a pantomime, complete with weird sing-a-longs to Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit and the Ramones’ Blitzkrieg Bop (yes, it’s as off-putting as it sounds). Garett Hedlund awkwardly over-pronounces all his lines as the Indiana Jones/Han Solo-esque Hook, whilst Rooney Mara, so effective in The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, barely makes an impression as the native princess Tiger Lily, besides constantly smirking at Hook and wearing the entire knitting aisle of a Spotlight store as a costume. And lastly, for all the visual acrobatics on display, there are definite places where you can see the seams in the effects and overall the CGI starts to overwhelm rather than enthral after a while.
In the end, you get the feeling that there were a bunch of opposing directives imposed on the film; one that wanted a darker origin story for the Disney-fied character, another that wanted to put in as much that people would recognise as possible, and yet another that wanted to keep it kid friendly. These differing views don’t sit well next to each other, and in the end they sap the film of it’s magic. Walking out I was left wondering if the better story to tell would be not how Peter and Hook met, but how they became sworn enemies. Now that might be a story that could take flight.
PAN is in cinemas now.