Saw Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, a film inevitably directed by Tim Burton about a group of magical children who live in a time bubble, an eternal, repeating day in a beautiful welsh island. The film was not that great.
I think Burton kind phoned this one in, Ed Wood style. There's a lot of stuff that's just there. The acting is good but sort of one-note: the fairy godmother woman is always perkily smiling, the mean boy is always sinister and mean. I think Burton was assigned this film because it's title is Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. Who else was going to direct it? Del Toro?
And so, since he got this film with no effort, he doesn't particularly want it or care about it. Yeah yeah the old-fashioned clothing, the women with tons of eyeliner, and the magical children, but we've done it all before. Where's Johnny Depp? There's only one scene that Burton's heart was clearly in: the scene where a skeleton army attacks. He even makes a cameo there. But the rest of it is very by the numbers.
But I'm being meaner than I mean to be. I like Burton's shtick, even when I suspect it's just left to the actors to direct themselves. His strength has always been kooky imagery, and while there isn't a ton of that here, there's enough to keep me happy. There's a nice climax and all, although there's also some bad child acting. For Burton fans only, a clumsy sort of film.
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