A fleshing out of familiar villain helps give Disney+'s 'Peter Pan & Wendy' some new life | Movie review

Apr. 28—A timeless story gets a fresh dusting of fairy magic with "Peter Pan & Wendy."

Based on J. M. Barrie's 1911 novel, "Peter and Wendy," and Disney's 1953 animated adaptation, "Peter Pan," the live-action film from the House of Mouse debuts this week on Disney+.

While no classic, "Peter Pan & Wendy" is a pretty charming affair, one that should be most appealing to relatively young children. (Parents note that it has earned a PG rating for a bit of violence and peril, but it's pretty mild stuff by today's standards.)

"Peter Pan & Wendy" is directed by David Lowery, who co-wrote it with Toby Halbrooks. For evidence, look no further than his 2021 medieval fantasy, "The Green Knight."

More pertinent to this new movie, though, is 2016's similarly well-received "Pete's Dragon," another live-action fantasy from Disney and also co-scripted by Halbrooks. According to the production information for "Peter Pan & Wendy," Disney approached Lowery, Halbrooks and producers Jim Whitaker with Adam Borba about taking on a live-action "Peter Pan" way back in 2015, when they were wrapping production on "Pete's Dragon."

Lowery says his first instinct was to pass — he was a fan of Barrie's story, but there already were strong adaptations out there, he says. However, he sat with it for a while, eventually finding a fresh connection to the tale's major theme.

"I feel more grown-up than I have in the past, and ironically, the thing that has always appealed to me about 'Peter Pan' is the idea of not growing up because I've been in arrested development for most of my life," he says in the production notes. "But lately — and for the first time — I feel like I have taken the first step into adulthood. So I chose to approach the movie from that perspective."

Set in London around 1911, the film begins in the Darling home, where young brothers John (Joshua Pickering) and Michael (Jacobi Jupe) are engaged in swordplay — as Peter Pan and Captain Hook — as older sister Wendy (Ever Anderson) is upset about going off to boarding school in the morning. (The carefully choreographed camera work by "Pete's Dragon" cinematographer tells us we are in for a film that's at least solid in the looks department.)

Also fond of the bedtime story of Peter Pan spun by her mother (Molly Parker), Wendy jumps into the play fray, and soon a mirror is broken as a result.

She pleads with her disappointed father (Alan Tudyk) that she was just having fun.

"You are too old for this to be the type of fun that you're having," he says.

Wendy's resistance to growing up draws a visit from the supposedly fictional Peter (Alexander Molony) — who has absolutely no interest in growing up himself — and his diminutive fairy sidekick, Tinker Bell (Yara Shahidi of "Black-ish" and "Grown-ish"), who rings but (mostly) doesn't speak and dislikes remarks about her size.

They whisk the kids off to the fantastical Never Land, following, of course, "the second star to the right and then straight on till morning."

Never Land is a beautiful place, but soon the lush hills and serene waters give way to the firing of cannon balls from the Jolly Roger, the ship of the nefarious — and children-detesting — Captain Hook (Jude Law).

Flanked by his trusted first mate, Smee (Jim Gaffigan), Hook demands myriad rules be followed in Never Land, an important one being no one says the name "Peter Pan." When that rule is broken, a door aboard the Jolly Roger bears the brunt of Hook's anger — the third he's destroyed this month.

Probably the most significant change made by Lowery and Halbrooks is the backstory they give the hook-handed captain, lending his adversarial dynamic with Peter some needed fuel. It's a very sensible bit of invention that adds resonance to century-old rivalry.

As this is Pan-Hook connection is fleshed out, the story shifts a bit from being Wendy-centric to Hook-centric, a minor issue. Also, we don't get much character development within the Lost Boys, Peter's gang of lads (and, in this version, lasses). Similarly, we would have liked a bit more time given to Alyssa Wapanatâhk's Tiger Lily, but the indigenous heroine gets an admirable updating here nonetheless.

The acting is a mixed bag, with Anderson ("Black Widow"), comedian Gaffigan ("Linoleum") and, not surprisingly, Law ("Captain Marvel"), bringing the most to the proceedings. Making his movie debut, Molony is uneven but a little interesting.

Overall, "Peter Pan & Wendy" struggles a bit to maintain a good flow but is entertaining despite the choppy storytelling. It's pretty similar to Disney's previous live-action updating of an animated classic to debut on Disney+, director Robert Zemeckis' "Pinocchio" — it gets the job done, if not magnificently so.

Pure Disney magic? Maybe not.

But hey, who couldn't use a sprinkling of fairy dust right now?

'Peter Pan & Wendy'

Where: Disney+.

When: April 28.

Rated: PG for violence, peril and thematic elements.

Runtime: 1 hour, 46 minutes.

Stars (of four): 2.5.