Like "The Wild", this movie could also be subtitled "Why we had to buy Pixar." It's a much more ambitious story than "Wild" but it just doesn't work.
The plot is convoluted but it involves time travel and what happens when you change the past, or something. I normally love that sort of thing (space-time continuum, represent!) but this time (pun intended) it just bothered me. Our hero is an orphan, which is always a pleasurable subject when watching a movie with young children; to be fair to my kids, neither one was fazed, so maybe I'm the one with the problem. The kid looks like Jonathan Lipnicky after he grows up, slims down and becomes truly weird. Of course, he's really a genius, and there's a villain out to get him but it's really the villain's hat that's in charge... or something. It's kind of a blur. The design elements are good. Pixar's John Lasseter was involved, which may account for the above-average visuals. But what works so well for Pixar -- well-written scripts, straightforward stories, combined with by far the best animation currently being produced -- completely eludes the Disney team here. Not nearly as painful to sit through as "The Wild", but still not great.
image: Amazon.com
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