Directed by: Marc Forster
Runtime: 104 minutes
I may be revealing too much on this website, but I have slept with the same teddy bear for as long as I remember. As a young, creative child, I named him ‘Ted’ and have had him rest on my bed ever since. He has been across the world with me and has been the best cuddle companion/monster slayer that I could have ever asked for. I feel like I need to give you this background, as I must admit, the first time I saw the Christopher Robin trailer… I cried. Perhaps it was seeing an old, matted bear calmly discussing adulthood with his life-long friend, or just hearing Winnie-the-Pooh’s voice come out of a live-action setting, but for some reason, the damn thing moved me to tears.
My initial reaction to the trailer, and the impact it had on me, was something I carried with me to the preview screening. With two small children in tow (relatives, not kidnap victims), my partner and I shamelessly used his two cousins to take photos with the cardboard cutouts of the bears, eat themed biscuits, and talk about our favourite ‘Pooh’ characters. This film does not put you back in contact with your inner child, it sets up a mediation, allowing you to fully embrace the silly immaturity that can get lost as bills, work, and credit card fees plunge you into adulthood.
The film revolves around a grown-up Christopher Robin, who after being sent to boarding school (and, eventually, a world war), ends up middle-aged and obsessed with his job as an ‘efficiency executive’ at a suitcase company. After misplacing his friends, Winnie-the-Pooh ventures to London to enlist Robin’s help, trying to cure his cynicism along the way. There are no surprises when it comes to the plot of this film—I basically had mapped out the main beats of the film as soon as the opening credits flashed on the screen—but, for what it was trying to do, it delivered. Bordering between abominably adorable and sickly sweet, the film asks you to forget the rest of the world for a while, and enjoy your time with some characters that are almost like old friends.
Executed any other way, the computer-generated Hundred Acre Wood crew would have broken this film, and it was a genius move to make them look like old, well-loved teddies. Pooh, in particular, provided an overwhelming innocent charm that only heartless monsters could be angered with. Jim Cummings returns to voice the character, making every word he speaks hit the audiences’ nostalgia-nerves. As for the others, while Tigger is once again played by Cummings, the rest are an assortment of fresh actors, to varying results. Brad Kern was born to voice Eeyore, his droll, depressive baritone fitting the character perfectly. The rest of the cast fit well enough, but I did find that Nick Mohammed’s rendition of Piglet was too different from the original for me to connect with. For the most part, the lovable, iconic characters were back, ready to comfort us.
Ewan McGregor and Hailey Atwell are two of the most charming people on the planet, so it is difficult to find much wrong with their performances here. Really, it is difficult to find much wrong with the film as a whole, as it was so well-intentioned and sweet, it feels almost beyond criticism. The one time my adult mind got the best of me was in handling its core message: “Doing nothing can lead to the best of something.” Perhaps it was just jealousy, but giving in to my longing to be able to stay permanently in my pyjamas as I reconnect with my childhood through Disney marathons on a weekday would probably cost me my job.
In essence, Christopher Robin is a lovely film. I won’t pretend that it’s a masterpiece of cinema, or even the best live-action, nostalgic, British-bear film (I feel like Paddington 2 will always hold that title), but it is a really nice time. As much as I tried to retain my adult brain while reviewing this film, I realise that my inner child has probably won over here—and my teddy bear is probably going to get a tighter cuddle when I climb into bed tonight.
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