It would be delightful to report they reached the nursery in time, but then there would be no story.

I'd read many glowing reviews of Peter Pan so I made a point of going to see it before it rotated out of theaters. I think I made it just in time, since there was only one theater in Seattle still showing it, and their last showing was at 4:30 pm. But I'm really glad I put the time in to seek it out.

This was a great movie. It was fun and entertaining and most importantly it had some good things to say about adolescence and growing up. What I was most struck by was how much it felt like a play. The set designs and colors they used certainly seemed like the kind of things you'd find in a play. But the similarities were deeper then that. There was overacting much like you'd see in a play and the shots felt longer and more focused on a character - allowing them to do a little more acting outside of dialog.

It's important to note that this movie really takes it's cues from the play and is darker and more mischevious then the Disney version. They also follow the play storyline quite closely and even have a scene where bring over the play tradition of getting the audience to help bring Tinkeybell back to life. I think it's interesting that they tried doing this, but their method of having lots of random people all over the place chanting on screen "I do, I do, I do believe in fairies" just didn't fit in the film context for me. It's the kind of thing that pulls be out of being really engaged in a movie, and I'm thinking that's one of the places where a change in medium dictates a change in content. It probably would have been a better movie with a different solution for that plot point.

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