Luca

First astonishing fact about this film: the main character’s parents aren’t dead. Second...well, there really isn’t anything else astonishing about this flick. It’s cute, reasonably entertaining—my attention did not wander at any point in its running time—visually impressive (though that hardly counts at this point, so refined is the state of the art) and at least a little bit heart-tugging. I doubt this one will ever enter into anyone’s pantheon—the somewhat similar Coco is substantially more memorable—but watching this work can hardly be considered a waste of time. And if you take it as an oblique homage to Italian cinema in general, then that adds a further dimension of pleasure to the experience. Like many a visit to the shore, this is enjoyable but ultimately ephemeral.

Peter Pan & Wendy

This movie must believe in magic, as it wants things to both  be and not to be. It wants sympathy for its devil, it wants both sides of the battle to win, it wants everything to be everything. None of that is really possible, even in the Neverland that is cinema, so the film’s inherent contradictions stand out as a distraction for the viewer. What redeems the proceedings to a great extent is the movie’s stylish presentation; visually and tonally, it gets everything largely right. (One might quibble about a touch of the modern invading the original Edwardian setting, but the discrepancy is not great enough to ruin the experience.) One of the sharpest decisions, and in some ways the most surprising, is to not make the secondary children characters too cloying or outright annoying; they stay reigned in for the most part and allow the principle characters--who are all strongly played, and include an almost unrecognizable Jude Law as Hook--to make the story theirs. I’m not prepared to call this the best version of the story on film--the 2003 version continues to shine for me--but this is a strong effort overall (and exceeds the studio’s 1953 animated version by miles). I believe this one can fly, at least, if not actually soar to the stratosphere.

Final

It's not that I don't believe Denis Leary as a traumatized man trying to cope with his mental problems. But the story here stays too shallow to make the struggle engaging. A film like this--a set piece with very little in the way of story progression--must be chock full of insight/wit/energy to keep the viewer tuned in. The pace here is too slow, and when the WTF moment comes, it's too unbelievable and its impact too muted to make a difference. Not worth it.