A short review of Disney’s Christopher Robin (2018) directed by Marc Forster
If there were any of you who have followed me closely for a while, you would know that I write reviews for movies. However, as I get busier with work these days, I can’t always afford to stay up for one night after I finish a movie to write what I call a full-length review. However, I do want to keep reviewing movies because watching movies is one of my favourite past-times, and I have no intention to stop watching them or reviewing them. And I also happen to think that watching movies is one of the best ways for second language learners to learn English as well. I am no expert in cinematography but I felt that some of the visuals were stunning and cinematic.
The scene with Robin’s mother standing as two dark figures hugging each other, grieving for their father, with the rain pouring outside, looked beautiful.
As did Christopher Robin’s second encounter with Pooh, which took place when each of them sat on a bench, with their heads tilted backwards, almost touching each other. It was a genuinely hearwarming scene.
First off, a bit of a summary of the plot. The film started off with a recount of how Christopher Robin and Pooh became the best of childhood friends. It then briefly and subtly touched on why Christopher Robin had no choice but to grow up — His father died and he had to become the man of the family.
So Christopher Robin grew up and became a bit of a workaholic, a man who prioritised work or even his family over fun, forgetting to stand by his childhood friend Pooh’s mantra, “Doing nothing always leads to the best something.” and instead came to champion the work ethic that his boss instilled in him, “Nothing comes from nothing.” This, natually, strained the relationship between Christopher and his wife Evelyn as well as that between him and his daughter, Madeline.
Needless to say, Christopher Robin’s unexpected encounter with Pooh inevitably led the film to an obvious and hardly unexpected ending — Christopher Robin realises that one does not have to lose the child in oneself to be a grown up. Spending time doing nothing and havin fun in nature rejuvenates us and inspires us to be a better version of ourselves, and thus do well at work and every other aspect in life. “All work and no play”, as Christopher Robin’s neighbour Cecil put it, is not a sustainable way to live our lives.
While there were some merits to the movie in general, needless to say, Ewan McGregor’s acting as well as certain parts of the script, it’s a shame that the narrative didn’t feel entirely logical or complete. There wasn’t really a sense of necessity to the story — we, as audience, don’t feel that the story had to happen. Why did Eeyore, Piglet, Owl, Tigger, Roo and Rabbit get lost in the first place? Why would Pooh fail to find them? Why would there be a magical passageway appearing out of nowhere between London and Sussex?
Some of the critics also rightly remarked that premise of the film was problematic in the first place. That Christopher Robin did NOT grow up to become a horrible man. He wasn’t a selfish man. He was actually an efficiency expert who worked hard to cut costs so that his fellow workers could keep their jobs, so it would seem that he didn’t become a workaholic because he wanted to. He became one because he had to. And it turned out that his boss didn’t have to work hard at the weekend either to save the ship from sinking. So it’s only fair that critics saw the film to be built on a faulty premise in the first place.
Christopher Robin not having grown into a horrible adult is also related to a point I wish to make about characterisation. The fact that Christopher Robin DIDN’T, as a matter of fact matured into a laothsome adult in effect WEAKENS the story and the main point that it’s trying to make. Since this story is about the desirability of preserving the child in oneself, the film could have done bette by showing how Christopher Robins, having become a selfish person and essential let the child in himself die, says harsh words that actually happen to have hurt Pooh and other animal friends. In this process, he would have realised, in remorse, that he could have realised how wrong and heartless he had been. Only in this way would there be a sufficiently stark contrast between the Christopher Robin as a boy and Christopher Robin as an adult. Instead, in this film, Ewan McGregor plays an unpleasing character who is decidedly too nice. So nice that he would, in fact, not hesitate to buy a red balloon just to satisfy the bear’s childly whim even though he is supposedly to have, against his own word, forgotten Winnie the Pooh as a grown-up. The film hasn’t made it clear that there is a lesson to be learned by Christopher Robin cause what is there to change about the character when there is hardly anything to hate about him?
Some critics have also observed that the CGI Winnie the Pooh and other animal pals such as Eeyore and Tigger could have looked better. That their colours didn’t pop enough; they looked too real; and they didn’t look as adorable as they could have. I think these are all valid points. The message of the movie also felt cliched and isn’t not particularly profound either.
I didn’t watch Paddington 1 but having watched Paddington 2, I would say that Paddington 2 was a made better than Christopher Robin as a family movie. Paddington 2’s objective was clearer. Its characterisation was better. Christopher Robin, at times, however, had a darker feel to it. It had the potential to be a more Tim Burtonesque kind of movie, darker, stranger and weirder. However, it now has the feeling of being torn between being a sweet and warm family movie and a more idiosyncratic kind of movie.
If your kids want to watch this movie, I guess it doesn’t hurt to go see it at the theatres. It’s not a must-watch like Mission Impossible 7 is. But if you really have to choose ONE family movie to watch, I am guessing that the Incredibles 2 is a better bet than this one. I have seen lots of good reviews about it whereas critics are pretty divided about Christopher Robin.