Pete's Dragon Review!
I have no idea why, but apparently Disney thought it was a good idea to remake all of their animated films into live action. They started with Burton's Alice in Wonderland, and while that made a lot of money it definitely left people confused and/or irritated. But Disney didn't give up, they tried again with Maleficent and again with Cinderella. The former with mixed opinions while the latter had good buzz. Now, their latest in their big live action adaptations is Pete's Dragon. When this was announced I felt like everyone in the world scratched their heads. Pete's Dragon is by no means Disney's heavy hitter of nostalgia, but even fans of it (me included) asked why. It didn't help that once the trailers came out and we saw a big fluffy Dragon, as well as an obscured plot, to make people want to go see this opening day. In a nut shell Pete's Dragon of 2016 just had so many questions surrounding it.
Like many people I'd say I'm getting tired of remakes, reboots, and sequels. This summer alone was disappointing because there were so many of these, and I will admit that I thought Pete's Dragon would have been one of the worst movies I'd see all year. I mean the trailers did nothing for me, and everything that was coming out about the film just didn't feel like they were trying to make anything other than another remake. Boy was I wrong!
Pete's Dragon is a great example of how a remake should be. It takes the same story of an orphaned boy befriending a dragon, and once they interact with a town their whole world shifts as each one starts to find their own place without the other. If you take the core of the story it's exactly the same as the original Pete's Dragon, but what makes this remake special is that it stands on its own. While the story is the same you feel like these are two separate Pete's Dragon movies and that's great! I feel that it has the perfect balance where fans of the original will like this, and younger fans who haven't will too.
The one thing that really stuck with me while watching this film was how much heart was put into it. You can tell that everybody working on this movie was trying to make a good movie, and not a remake. The film making can be seen as slow to some, if not most, people, but I ate it up because it really got us to love these characters. You follow Pete and Elliot playing together in the woods, and while you're not getting any plot by watching this you are getting character moments that will slowly make you become attached to Pete and Elliot. So much so that once Pete is "captured" and thrown into the town you understand his fear and confusion.
Speaking of Pete, I was really impressed with Oakes Fegley who played him. Usually adults will roll their eyes when at a kid's movie simply because the kid "isn't a good actor." Fegley is so comfortable in the role as Pete that I couldn't believe it. What impressed me the most was that in his performance he had animalistic ticks. While it is something you'd expect in this movie it's almost as easy to just let the kid walk and act like himself, but he went that extra mile so that when he's sitting on furniture he's crouching on it, when he's encountering strange objects that are everyday to us it's hysterical to see how he reacts, and through these tiny moments you really can see how terrified he is of this world. Honestly, I'm not sure if they could have done a better casting job than this.
Speaking of the cast some might say that there wasn't enough of them to grasp their deep characters, or just say they did what was serviceable, but to that I'd say they did their jobs with heart. This story is about Pete, and I wasn't expecting deep characters in anyone, but there's enough of each character that you know who they are and you seen enough of them that their more than just serviceable to the movie. The actors take their characters and really put a lot of emotion and heart into the story.
As for the Dragon himself I have to admit that I thought he was adorable. In a big way he's just a big dog, but that didn't detract from the film at all. As you care for Pete you care as much for Elliot. While it is hard to hate an animal, Elliot really had some powerful scenes. Pete is very precious to him, so when he disappears you embark on this journey with Elliot to get him back. You wish that he gets Pete back, but in this movie you see Elliot make some really mature decisions regarding him.
Now as you probably know by now I wasn't a fan of the trailers. I thought they were trying to hide what didn't need to be hid, and they were trying to hard to be something it wasn't. The film looked very serious, and dull at times. After watching the film I will say that the trailers didn't do it any justice. The biggest joke in the trailer was "You can't say dragon over the radio" and that's it. Really? Out of all the actual funny scenes in this movie you decide to promote one of the worst ones? In a way I guess that was fine because you always want to save your best jokes, but man I felt really bad thinking I might not have gone to watch this film.
Pete's Dragon is a really well made movie and a wonderful family movie. It's full of heart and passion that you just don't see often enough in family films, which is sad. The characters are really interesting and at moments their performances really shine. At the end of the day I felt that Pete's Dragon was not only how a remake should be made, but I loved it so much that I'm happy this generation of kids will have their own Pete's Dragon to bond with.
8/10
