Peter Pan.(Movie Review)

PETER PAN

P.J. Hogan (d), P.J. Hogan and Michael Goldenberg (w), Aus, 2003, 109 Minutes, Rated PG. ACTORS INCLUDE: Rachel Hurd-Wood, Jeremy Sumpter, Jason Isaacs, Olivia Williams, Lynn Redgrave. DVD FEATURES INCLUDE: Deleted Scene and Alternate Ending, Set Tours, Featurettes and Outtakes.

James Barrie wrote in The Little White Bird that 'if you ask your mother whether she knew about Peter Pan when she was a little girl, she will say, why of course I did child'. There is something obviously knowing about such a question-it suggests that every girl coming of age will be fated to meet the little boy who 'never grew up'. And as Barrie's Peter and Wendy chronicles, it is every mother's responsibility to recognize the warning signs and relegate such knowledge to No Man's Land--just as her mother would have when she was a little girl. Peter, of course, takes his name from Pan, the god of fertility and carnality, who watches over creation by pervading all things. Storytelling becomes the little white lie mothers tell boys and girls to ensure safe passage from one age and generation to another, where a child's imagination may be used as a mechanism for self expression and control. The fate of mankind therefore rests on women telling children bed time stories about a promised land called the 'happy ever after'. Unfortunately, Hogan's Peter Pan surprisingly obscures the relation between the regulations of marriage and the fate of civilization. We say surprising because the director of Muriel's Wedding and My Best Friend's Wedding is usually alert to the phenomenon of female connections and bonds. If any male filmmaker could have been faithful to Barrie's psychologically complex tale, it would certainly have been him. Whatever the film's strengths, it fails to capture the reflexive character of Barrie's extraordinary novel, and the way it is intended to comment upon the repressive nature of storytelling itself.

The good news, though, is that Hogan has made the best version of Peter Pan thus far. Although that might not be saying much, it at least puts him ahead of attempts by Walt Disney and Steven Spielberg. Hogan even reveals himself to be almost as visually eloquent as his more esteemed peers. Peter Pan is often spectacular to look at, and its 'story book' visuals are a credit to the Australian production design. The film also improves on previous attempts by foregrounding the fact that the arrival of Peter Pan (Sumpter) ...