I know this movie has been getting horrible reviews, but I rather liked it. It wasn’t the greatest movie, but it was well done with a strong cast and it was rather dark when you really look at it.
Which we will be.
Despite the fact that this was sold as a kids movie, and it does have a child as the main character, I honestly don’t think that this movie is a kids movie. They also did something that you don’t see too often, they added more depth to the movie than I think the book has.
What do I mean?
Well, this is set in about 1950 or so, around Halloween of that year, and so we are in a post-war (WWII) American world. Which ends up being super important. Because that is the reason that the clock in the walls exists.
There are so many things in this movie that makes it much darker than it appears. Sure, you have the fart jokes and what-not, but there are real things that are in here. That are kind of twisted if you think about it (and I will only mention this once, BABY JACK BLACK WAS HORRID AND UNNECESSARY).
The first thing, that I think a lot of people won’t pick up on but I did due to ALL of the novels I have read this last year that relate back to Concentration camps. When Mrs. Zimmerman is giving the boy a tray of cookies, her sleeve rides up to reveal the tell-tale tattoo of the concentration camps. And we know by that point that she was in Paris during the war and that she, though we didn’t know until then, had lost her husband and daughter. And, at one point, she tells Lewis that “the injury healed on the outside, but the inside might never heal.” So, she had injuries etc from that time, and because of her inner scarring she can’t use her magic the way she used to. Until she considers Lewis her family.
Continuing on Mrs. Zimmerman, look at the way she kills the pumpkins and how she, literally, gasses the nasty toys. Just, look.
What I am saying is, there is a lot more going on with this movie than meets the eye. And I don’t know if I would take my young child to it.
