Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (2016) Review!!!

Synopsis – When Jacob discovers clues to a mystery that stretches across time, he finds Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. But the danger deepens after he gets to know the residents and learns about their special powers.

My Take – Twentieth Century Fox brings another YA novel to the screen. When I first saw the trailer of this film, my first thought of course was that this is Tim Burton‘s version of the X-Men, which pretty much rings true. But despite the X-Men similarities, I have to admit that the film is unique, I’ll give it that. Mostly for doing what everyone else is not doing. I went into the theater expecting some sort of combo between Marvel comics and JK Rowling, but this Tim Burton film is a little tamer than what I expect from an action adventure these days. This film is both a fish out of water story combined with a magical adventure that mildly comments on the human condition. Of all the YA films that have been produced over the last few years, this one provides a much more dynamic experience than many of the others. Luckily for us this film marks the much touted return to form of one of the most delightful directors out there. Here, Burton delights audiences with the classic Burton style that many of us have grown up with. There are elements of Frankenweenie in it, there’s a little bit of Big Fish too and Edward Scissorhands as well, full of Goth and oddities, if this film had been directed by somebody else, it would’ve done the story disservice because the world and the characters that author Ransom Riggs created in his novel are pretty much in Tim Burton’s neck of the woods. Director Tim Burton is a very weird and peculiar person and has had quite a strange and rather long career trajectory than most so it seemed that he was the right fit to make a film like this. Based on the 2011 novel by Ransom Riggs it turned into a rather strange bestseller for people who seemed to want a horror, story but in the film it seems to go for the familiar edge rather than the, peculiar edge and doesn’t seem to go for the same originality as the book (An opinion based on what I read from Wikipedia).

The story follows Jake (Asa Butterfield) who lives a normal life with his parents (Chris O’Dowd & Kim Dickens). He has a boring home life, an eccentric grandfather, and a job that he hates. For quite sometime Jake was perhaps the only one who really connected with his grandfather Abe (Terrence Stamp). He would babysit him and tell him all the tales of his adventures, and even once those tales became a fantasy to Jake they stayed with him. However, with his grandpa old it seems he takes those old tales more factual than ever. Marking his shocking death, in which Jake is the first to find him, Abe rehashes information about his fairy tales. While Jake’s parents think the incident could have mentally affected him, they force him to visit a psychiatrist, which Jake agrees to. However, upon finding a mysterious letter, Jake is determined to find the home in which his grandfather grew up. Accompanied by his cynical father, Jake returns to the island where his grandfather grew up. And ends up stumbling across the children’s home ran by Miss Peregrine (Eva Green), Jake teams up with the most unusual but fascinating people who are in a rush against time to defeat those who are out to destroy them. To be honest, the plot of the film is really good. I loved a couple concepts like home for peculiar children, time loop and actually peculiar powers that the kids had which we haven’t really seen in any of the films yet. The script is playful yet sincere, exploring death and grief sensitively but with a darkness without being traumatizing. Sure, some of the film is spooky but not in a way that will make parents outrage about unsuitability for their children. While there are problems with the story in the first half, the second half is deliciously dark, forebodingly gloomy, impishly humorous and poignant especially in the entire scene where it is explained how the central character, Jake, fits into the entire context. There are memorable scenes here, such as the bombing, the chemistry between the two young characters and especially the thrilling climax. Part of what makes Ransom Rigg‘s novel special and popular is that it contains vernacular photographs as a guide to put together the narrative. Burton incorporates some of that into the film but they’re there mainly at the beginning, just to set up the context. The design for the hollowgasts and what they eat to sustain themselves or to survive, some might see it as too scary for younger viewers, but I see it more as unique. But that’s the thing though with many of Tim Burton‘s family adventure films, they’re never meant to walk on egg shells. They are fairy tales that find beauty in the dark and they bring out courage in characters that society marginalizes, and this film is no different. This film is everything that this years massive flop sequel Alice Through the Looking Glass (which Burton produced) had going for it, expanded more in depth, and had a much better story holding it together. The children all have their weird powers and oddities, most of which have been seen from the trailer, but others show a great deal of creativity. One child can project his dreams in a prophetic style and broadcast them like a film projector. Another, not exactly seen from the trailer, had the ability to use hearts and make puppets out of otherwise nonliving beings. The twins, heavily advertised in the trailer but kept as secret as possible, quite possibly have the scariest looking powers you will see.

After Big Eyes, people were missing Burton‘s weird touch in the cinematic world. Thankfully, the strange director has returned and delivered in spades, bringing his usual bag of tricks into the mix. Peregrine’s home alone looks like something out of a bizarre dream, with its residents mirroring Burton’s twisted sense of fun (e.g. mouths on the back of their heads or experimenting with the dead). Even the antagonists certainly look like something pulled from the occult particularly the long limbed, multi-tongued sightless Hollows that hunt our heroes. The underlying theme is that Burton’s edge is all over this film and brought out in decent visual effects. Burton‘s team use a combination of make-up and computers to create these weird wonders, with the make up being the more realistic and impressive component. Although I liked the characters and the overall premise of the film I did find it quite predictable and nonsensical at times, lots of unexplained things too. Quite a lot of things were ‘too conveniently placed’ and sort of just happen to be there, and was just too predictable with no surprises throughout. Also about the characters, there were many others that just seem a lot more interesting but get very few screen time, most notably the twins. Although towards the end we finally get a look at their abilities I do find them by far the most interesting and mysterious characters who I personally would’ve wished to explore more. One of my biggest issues however was with the villain of the film, Samuel L Jackson‘s character of the big bad just comes out as odd. His motivations weren’t well realized and his presence was not really felt until the later quarter of the film. Perhaps more build up from the beginning would give me more of an understanding of this villain. Yet I would recommend this film, mainly because, the film feels richer in texture, style and in how the actors relate together and the emotional context of things comes out than I’ve seen in a fantasy film from Burton in a long time. And on its own it works as as a delightful and often dark-for-kids (as it should be) story of overcoming fears and that feeling of being ‘different’ as a mark against someone. Those who know me well know that I’m a huge Eva Green‘s fan, her involvement is definitely this film’s big attraction to me, but I think she’s just absolutely perfect in this role, Green has that natural instinct when it comes to playing a mysterious powerful character, something she previously showed in the recently ended Showtime series, Penny Dreadful, and now she unleashes that same vibe for this film. Samuel L. Jackson‘s performance despite having a lesser screen time was nothing less than masterful. Chris O’Dowd was funny. Asa Butterfield was alright. Ella Purnell, Judi Dench, Rupert Everett, Terence Stamp, Finlay MacMillan and Lauren McCrostie play their parts well. The younger ones are also delightful. On the whole, “Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children” is a patchy but an enjoyable combination of dark humor and action which sees the return to form of the curious Tim Burton.