Film Review: Finding Neverland
Finding Neverland does indeed prove its worth in recognizing the impact of a great story.
If there were ever a film conceived that you could rely on to believe in the power and value of a compelling, well-told story, Finding Neverland would seem to fit the assumption as well as any. After all, Peter Pan was not your everyday story in the day that it was written, and as the film would have you believe, not many people, including his own benefactor, could begin to comprehend where James Barrie was going when he was putting it together. As it turns out, the film holds unwaveringly true to its pedigree, treading lightly where a less tactful form would turn the final product into sticky sweet trifle without a whole lot of substance. Anchored by a number of wonderful performances, Finding Neverland stands tall in the often unpredictable, catch-all genre of "biopic."
Thanks to the critical tanking of his latest play, James Barrie (Johnny Depp, with a thick, convincing Scottish brogue) is on tenuous ground. His American producer, Charles Frohman (Dustin Hoffman) finds himself vacillating between nervous confidence and noticeable skepticism, keeping a straight face in public despite his demoralized tone. Frohman is not taking well to the blithe muttering of the lingering crowd, an upper crust group whose level of satisfaction correlates directly with the recouping of his investment. Barrie deflects the downbeat air of the room and assures Frohman that his next story will be a hit. Problem is, nothing puts a crimp into the creative process or raises the ire of any artist more than the mere mention of a bottom line.
As a man relied upon solely for a product that entertains the public, Barrie finds himself caught in the middle of the never-ending internal struggle between artistic vision and commercial success. He doesn't want to compromise the natural path of his inner storyteller, but being forced into a scenario where another financial failure means his ruination isn't exactly a conceptual dream. While sitting in the park cooking up his next greatest creation, he crosses paths with Sylvia Llewelyn Davies, a widow saddled with watching over her four sons, a burden that dominates much of her life. The remaining part of her life is effectively overshadowed by her overbearing mother (Julie Christie), who feels entitled to fill in the void left by Sylvia's late husband, in addition to asserting her belief that James should not be involved.
Barrie forms a bond with the comely widow and her boys, much to the disenchantment of both Sylvia's mother and his own wife, Mary (Radha Mitchell), who besides being patently suspicious about James' motivation for accompanying Sylvia and her family around is resentful of being demoted to second fiddle. James seems to be aware that his own marriage is in flux, but in deference to his prior dilemma, creating a new play, he never seems to be visibly worried about it, even as his home life becomes gradually more disconcerting.
Even as everything around seems to be in a constant state of tumult, James takes solace and inspiration from the Davies family, especially in the novel attempts of the youngest son, Peter (Freddie Highmore), to write his own play. Adapting his life experiences onto the page, James puts together an altogether whimsical story, the disconnected rehearsals of which heighten Frohman's creeping sense of dread. Frohman remains worrisome, but his lack of broad reactionary strokes leads one to believe that he comprehends that a vision does exist in Barrie's mind. The cards continue to fall for James, but he remains plainly unaffected, even as one last major crisis threatens to separate him from his vision.
Unlike the sprawling, more ambitious film biographies that often exceed their bounds due to an overabundance of key material, Finding Neverland keeps itself grounded by voluntarily focusing on a more sustainable period of time, which allows the film a greater degree of narrative flexibility. The film puts the impetus less on the whole life of James Barrie than the segment of time in and around the creation of Peter Pan, which practically dispenses with the chaff that may have been included in a film with a broader scope. Consistently underpinning the film is the inherent inability of the bourgeois mind to grasp the thoughts of a person whose imagination makes them tick. Frohman is included in this group, but his responsibility to his beneficiary causes him to stay the course, even if he doesn't have an inkling to what is going on in James' head. This is more than can be said for most everyone else, doubters who see Barrie as a wandering soul with no real applicable career skills.
Finding Neverland, aside from the steady, confident hand of director Marc Forster, is buoyed by almost every performance, from Depp all the way down to the precocious Highmore, whose work here was rumored to have earned him a spot in the upcoming Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, also to feature Depp. Kate Winslet appears to have fended off what could have been a guaranteed one-way ticket to ignominy in Titanic, with successive well-chosen roles in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and now Finding Neverland. It's just about enough to make you forget she was ever in Titanic, which many people, including me, are thankful for. The young men who play the Davies boys are also deserving of high praise, being that this project could’ve never been pulled off had not the kids been able to convincingly carry the gravity of their roles.
Finding Neverland does indeed prove its worth in recognizing the impact of a great story. It's an honest, graceful picture, the rare modern film that is wholly devoid of any cynicism. While it might tug at the heartstrings a little too earnestly at times, it’s the sort of emoting that doesn’t make the audience feel as if they’ve been pushed and prodded to that conclusion. There’s a foggy line between shameless manipulation and honest-to-goodness storytelling, and for once in the 21st Century, an honorable film like Finding Neverland walks safely on the side of the latter.
FINDING NEVERLAND
Directed by: Marc Forster
Cast: Johnny Depp, Kate Winslet, Julie Christie, Dustin Hoffman