Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children (2016) - Film Review

Starring: Asa Butterfield, Eva Green, Samuel L. Jackson & Ella Purnell

Screenplay: Jane Goldman

Directed By: Tim Burton

Certificate: 12

 

Not all directors out there have a film-making style as iconic and recognisable as Tim Burton. While not all of his films have set the world on fire critically (Alice In Wonderland springs to mind), he's still delivered plenty of Gothic and eccentric hits such as Corpse Bride, Edward Scissorhands, Beetlejuice and more. To be honest, unlike many people I'm not all that familiar with much of Tim Burton's work, and some of the films I've just mentioned are ones I've yet to see at the time of writing. But what I do know is that since hitting his peak financial success in 2010, not all of his films have been that successful at the box office. So now we have a film perfect for him to adapt – Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children. Surely this is a match made in heaven?

 

Sixteen year-old Jake Portman has grown up hearing stories from his granddad Abe about a home for peculiar children, run by the mysterious Miss Peregrine. At the age of sixteen, Jake begins to dismiss the stories as mere bedtime tales, but when he finds his granddad murdered with his eyes removed, Abe's dying wish is for him to find Miss Peregrine's home for peculiar children. Hoping to find the house, Jake travels with his father to Wales. It's here that he meets Miss Peregrine and learns that his granddad's tales were more than just stories...

 

Fans of his work can be rest assured that Tim Burton delivers another visual tour de force in this film. One of the many things I really admired about Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children was its combination of different styles. For instance, we have inspiration from and take visits to the present day, but also the 1940s and not forgetting the children's home itself. Tim Burton does a great job of combining and balancing all of these settings, but its of course the peculiar children's home that plays to all his directorial strengths. Like I said, this film is a perfect match for him, and for its budget it looks brilliant with some amazing set design on display as well as great action sequences I wouldn't have minded seeing more of. Easily the best action set-pieces are those that involve as many of the children as possible and see them get to use their individual peculiarities.

 

Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children is just as unique as its title suggests and is very, very creative as we should come to expect from the man in the director's chair. All of this film's creative power is channelled into the children and with great results. There's too many to list them all, but to give a few examples, we have an invisible child, one with super-strength, one that can float, one that can set fire to anything she touches, and another that can release bees from his stomach. It also works in this film's favour that every single child actor immerses themselves in their roles admirably. Each gets a chance to use their own peculiarity when battling against their enemies, the Hollows, and each is brought to life by some brilliant CGI work.

 

But most of the characters here are more than just their peculiarities, and are in fact multi-layered and interesting personalities. As we should again expect from one of the best young actors working today, Asa Butterfield turns in a great lead performance as Jake. Though Jake isn't going to down as one of cinema's best characters, he's saved by Asa Butterfield's enduring performance and acts as a much-needed bridge between the audience and the rest of the children. Even more impressive is Eva Green as the crossbow-wielding Miss Peregrine – a character that can herself control time and transform into a peregrine falcon. With the comically large pipe, no-nonsense attitude and old headmistress feel, it's difficult not to fall in love with this character. Even Judi Dench makes a brief appearance as Miss Avocet, who wields similar powers. While Judi Dench is of course welcome here, I find it difficult to believe that the film armed her with Miss Peregrine's crossbow and we didn't get to see her fire it! Another impressive performance comes from Ella Purnell as Jake's floating love interest Emma. Just like Asa Butterfield, Ella Purnell does a solid job but the romance between the two characters, whilst sweet, never really had the time to take off (pun intended), as there was so much story to get through instead. The romance between peculiars Enoch and Olive fared even worse, with Enoch never coming across a likeable enough character for there to be any believable attraction between the two.

 

For a film that markets itself to a family audience, our main monsters the Hollows are genuinely unsettling and threatening, as are their motives. It's not just swastika-branded planes in the sky that Ms Peregrine and her children have to face, but also literal monsters in the form of the Hollows. These giant, eyeless and tentacled creatures are invisible to all but Jake and can regain human form by eating the eyes of peculiars. Mr Barron, their leader, is an intimidating presence thanks to another fantastic performance from Samuel L Jackson (there's some serious talent in this film isn't there?). While there'll always be some who argue Samuel L Jackson is just playing himself again, I ask is that really such a bad thing? I loved the twist/reveal that introduced Mr Barron for his first scene, and the character continues to get even better from here. Admittedly I was disappointed that at one point towards the end of the film, Mr Barron is hacking his way through a door, and Samuel L Jackson didn't get the chance to say “Here's Barron!”.

 

The one serious thing that stops this film from being an utterly fantastic watch is that it becomes needlessly complicated and suffers some narrative issues. The first half-hour of the film sees Jake trying to solve the mystery of who or what killed his granddad. The audience are right behind him with this mystery … except it's not a mystery. We SEE what killed Abe, and from that moment know that he was telling the truth about the children's home. This might not sound like a problem, but when the film tries to temporarily mislead us and ask whether Abe was telling the truth, we already know the answer and every moment Jake spends with his family looking for the home entirely drags the pacing down. But the BIGGEST problem with this film is that it gets far too complicated for its own good. Fairly early on, its established that peculiars live as groups in different time loops scattered all across the world, persecuted by Hollows and that if they leave their time loop for longer than about twenty-four hours, time catches up with them and they die. The loop is sustained by characters like Miss Peregrine but when her time loop closes, the peculiars have to get to Miss Avocet's loop in 2016. The last half-hour of the film, while entertaining thanks to the plentiful and impressive action, makes zero sense, especially on the first few watches. Characters go through so many different time zones and time loops that I just can't fathom what's happening. Which time zone are we in? What are we trying to do? How are we doing it? How are the peculiars still alive outside their time loop? Plot-wise, the last act becomes a total mess, but its still entertaining to see the peculiars and the Hollows do battle with each other.

Still, when we think of Tim Burton's films, we don't remember them for their story but rather what we see on screen. Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children follows this same trend, but it's still definitely worth watching and enjoying. There's a lot of talent involved with this film and its thoroughly entertaining. It does one of the many things I love about film so much – it's pure escapism, and given the time in which this film was released, I think we could all do with a little escapism like this.

Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children



7/10