For example, if you “Visit the Darling House” you can see an alternate ending (with Wendy all grown up), deleted scenes, a profile of the Saint Bernard that played Nana, and a featurette about animated Peter’s runaway shadow. The Blu-ray and DVD editions feature a menu designed for kids to explore. Subscribe to the Stream On Demand weekly newsletter (your E-mail address will not be shared) and follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Availability may vary by service.ĭon’t miss a single recommendation. Ludivigne Sagnier pantomimes and chirps with a mischievous streak like a live action Daffy Duck as Tinkerbell and Olivia Williams co-stars as the mother.Īlso on Blu-ray and DVD and on SVOD through Amazon Video, iTunes, GooglePlay, Fandango, Vudu and/or other services. A true delight, it should restore anyone’s faith in fairy tales. Wendy’s last escape into the magic of her stories, before she says farewell to childhood, is as simultaneously real and unreal as anything in her life. To my mind Hogan has created both the most compassionate and perceptive interpretation of the tale to date, as well as the most visually splendid. The film revels in the child-like delight of make-believe and fantastic adventure but also allows the darker edges of fantasy, from a villainous Captain Hook (a hearty Jason Isaacs) who has a tendency to shoot dead the dissenting voices of his pirate crew to eel-like mermaids with a feral nature. It’s as if they’ve floated into one of Wendy’s stories and transformed the world around them through the mind’s eye of imagination. The kids alight on cotton candy clouds, soar through a sky painted in pastel hues, and navigate a flying ship around the clock towers and church spires that break through the foggy sea of London. The magic of CGI and modern special effects that has so often been used to bring fantasy down to Earth-to make it “real”-has been sprinkled with fairy dust by Hogan to give life to the unreal. To her rescue comes her storybook creation Peter Pan (a wild-eyed Jeremy Sumpter), who whisks Wendy and her brothers out of their Victorian playroom, up to the stars, and off to Neverland. Rachel Hurd-Wood brings a tomboyish spirit to Wendy, a girl on the verge of being a young woman who recoils from growing up. Hogan’s deft and delightful take on the oft-filmed J.M.
You may feel like you’ve stepped into the pages of a storybook illustrated by Maxfield Parrish when you fly off to Neverland in Peter Pan (2003), P.J.