Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children

Dir: Tim Burton

2016

****

While Ransom Riggs's initial story may not sound particularly original, indeed, the 'Young Adult' genre is flooded with spooky fantasy, time-traveling sci-fi and 'the chosen one' themed adventure, but I would argue that his is far superior to most others. It is the perfect story for Tim Burton also, and it feels like something of a return to form for the kooky director. I really liked Big Eyes (2014), proof that he was still a great director but it wasn't classic Burton that we all know and love. I quite liked Frankenweenie too but it felt like unfinished business, moving backwards rather than forward. I think before that the last film of his I liked was 2003's Big Fish - which again didn't quite feel like one of his films, and the last film of his that I loved was 1996's Mars Attacks and that was twenty years ago. He's back though with Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, although this typical humour isn't there and the mood is far darker than it has been before. It's almost a showcase of all of his talents and his collective visual flare can be seen throughout. I saw Beetlejuice in there, definitely some Edward Scissorhands, a bit of Sleepy Hollow and Big Fish, Big Eyes, dark Shadows and even Mars Attacks. No Batman or Pee-Wee Herman though, but that would have been ridiculous. A return to form indeed. In all seriousness though, it does look good, with all the visual flare you could hope from the cult director. Composition and visual flare aside, there are some wonderfully unexpected scenes that took me by pleasant surprise that I would never associate with Burton. It was like visiting an old friend but without any of the forgivable clichés you might expect. It's really scary too. Burton's films have been known to frighten but generally there is humour there or something sweet to take the fear away but here it is full on dark terror. Refreshingly creep stuff, that's for sure. There is an element of humour when it comes to Samuel L. Jackson's Mr. Barron, but then he isn't meant to be an all evil, all powerful, unstoppable villain, he's just a shapeshifter that likes eating children's eyeballs is all. The only problem I had with the film was the clumsy narrative. It was particularly confusing towards the end of the film, I had to just detach myself from the sudo-science of it all and just take it for granted but by the end I was left with many unanswered questions, ones that I found to be particularly bothersome. Also, my favourite scene of the whole film was also the scene that bothered me the most. Towards the end, the Hollows (think The Slender Man but not as well dressed) fight a group of resurrected skeletons (ex-passengers of the sunken RMS Augusta - that may or may not be based on the RMS Empress of Scotland?) on Blackpool pier. Burton once listed The Golden Voyage of Sinbad in his top 5 favourite films of all time and is clearly a big Ray Harryhausen fan and this scene is clearly a huge tribute to the man and his work. It's glorious, except it was given a fast-paced dance soundtrack that sounded beyond awful. A very strange and unfortunate move. The ending was rushed, while the beginning of the film was rather slow. A few tweaks and it could have been perfect. I'm not sold on Asa Butterfield just yet but Ava Green was perfect in the titular role. Terence Stamp, Judi Dench, Chris O'Dowd, Samuel L. Jackson and Rupert Everett make for quite a wonderful mixed bag of talent and each actor is given a role perfectly suited to them but not necessarily as we've ever seen them before. It's really not perfect but I think that's what I liked about it, it was original and cliché-free. It ticked all the right boxes for me, I have no idea how much of an authentic adaptation it is but I really felt that Burton was back where he belonged but also trying something new.