Reviewed by Victor Rebikoff.
Director: Tim Burton, 20th Century Fox, M 127 Minutes.
The brilliant filmmaker Tim Burton is noted for making unusually dark fantasy films such as ‘Sweeney Todd’ and he does not disappoint with his 2016 movie based on Ransom Riggs’ best-selling adult novel of the same name.
In ‘Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children’ Burton has created a weird but wonderful world in his fantasy drama that goes beyond the realms of imagination, transcending freely between past and present time zones.
As the story begins an ordinary boy named Jacob (Asa Butterfield – ‘Ender’s Game’) travels back in time to 1940 prior to coming across a grand castle-like building housing a number of peculiar children and then becoming besotted with a floating girl.
There he meets the mysterious Miss Peregrini (Eva Green – ‘Sin City’) and the beautiful Emma Bloom (Ella Purnell – ‘Wildlike’) wearing steel shoes before returning to his time where he must contend with his distressed dad Frank (Chris O’Dowd – ‘The Program’).
As one later learns it is Jacob’s grandfather Abe (Terence Stamp – ‘Big Eyes’) who had adventures as a young boy travelling back and forth in time that prompted his grandson to venture to this time zone in the first place.
After his grandfather’s mysterious death at the hands of the ghostly monsters known as the “Hollows” Jacob is told of the greater danger threatening Peregrine’s distinctly otherworldly group of gifted children from the deranged Barron (Samuel L Jackson – ‘Avengers’).
Wasting little time Jacob returns to the otherworld but this time with the clear objective of helping Miss Peregrine by utilising each of the children’s individual powers, including an invisible boy, to defeat the dangerous Barron.
Burton has gone to great lengths to bring Riggs’ first of three time-travelling books to the big screen, besides injecting his own dark style to the storyline to make the movie more visually appealing and entertaining.
In addition to the captivating performance from Green as Miss Peregrini the other major highlights are the particular peculiarities demonstrated by the charming children in many of the enjoyable scenes shared with both Butterfield and Purnell.
Miss Peregrini’s Home For Peculiar Children is being televised on 7FLIX at 5.55pm on Friday 19 February.
Vic’s Verdict: 3 ½ Stars