{"id":29400,"date":"2018-11-02T05:22:36","date_gmt":"2018-11-02T09:22:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=29400"},"modified":"2018-11-02T09:32:04","modified_gmt":"2018-11-02T13:32:04","slug":"nutcracker-and-the-four-realms-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2018\/11\/02\/nutcracker-and-the-four-realms-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"The Nutcracker and the Four Realms (2018)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Disney re-visits their staple of public domain tales with another visit with \u201cThe Nutcracker,\u201d a ritual that\u2019s annual for most movie studios. No matter what year it is, some studio thinks they can offer an artistic, original, or hip take on \u201cThe Nutcracker,\u201d and every year it\u2019s terrible. Even with Disney injecting the classic ballet with the spectacle of Robert Zemeckis, the eccentricity\/whimsy of Tim Burton, and a vague cribbing from 1939\u2019s \u201cThe Wizard of Oz\u201d (bordering on plagiarism), \u201cThe Nutcracker and The Four Realms\u201d is a hollow effort to turn the musical composition in to a hit holiday movie. And perhaps a hit holiday movie franchise. You know they\u2019ve focus grouped it and are planning parts two to seven, right now.<\/p>\n

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Still reeling from the loss of their mother, Clara, and her brother and sister struggle to find a direction in their life, including her father, who is trying to continue the Christmas festivities. When Clara and her family go to Drosselmeyer\u2019s mansion for a Christmas Celebration, Clara is given a mysterious metal egg left to her by her late mother that also has a magical key to open it with. While trying to figure out the egg, Clara drifts in to a portal to another world, known as The Four Realms. There she learns her mother once ruled the kingdom as the queen, and joined by the Sugar Plum Fairy, the Snow Realm King, and the Flower Realm King, she learns about her mother\u2019s legacy. Meanwhile, she enters in to a battle with Mother Ginger, hoping to defeat her and the rodent army, and retrieve the key, which will revive the toy army, giving Sugar Plum Fairy a chance to fight back.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Nutcracker and the Four Realms\u201d (or \u201cAlice in Nutcracker Land\u201d) garners two directors and feels like three movies struggling to break free. One of them is a Christmas movie about a cloistered young girl learning about her mother\u2019s legacy, the second one is the same vein but told through a more artistic function of dance, performance art, and exploration. The third is a clumsy fantasy epic that feels almost like a verbatim cribbing of the Disney \u201cAlice in Wonderland\u201d live action movie, right down to Alice suiting up with the land\u2019s army, and battling the villain with CGI creatures. While the film isn\u2019t awful, it\u2019s so poorly cobbled together from too many cooks in the kitchen and some crafty demographic tailoring.<\/p>\n

Much of what happens is all so disjointed and jumbled, that it never feels like one big cohesive epic. The attempted ideas introduced about grief, longing for a lost one, and learning how to find joy in one\u2019s lasting legacy, are all lost in a slew of bland characters. And no matter how much they paint Keira Knightley, her role here is forgettable. Just about everyone here is forgettable save for MacKenzie Foy, whose performance is spirited, charming, and often heartfelt. She truly feels like a girl who is in desperate need of her mother after losing her, it\u2019s just a shame her journey is treated so bizarrely. From her introduction to the macguffins of the egg and the key, to her meeting with the enigmatic Drosselmeyer, it\u2019s all so vanilla.<\/p>\n

Even when Clara drifts from Drosselmeyer\u2019s mansion in to the magical Four Realms, it is greeted with such a cursory attitude. As she approaches the Four Realms and ascends in to the magical land she looks so much more like someone who is walking in to a fancy wardrobe. \u201cThe Nutcracker and the Four Realms\u201d has very little chance to offer something of substance or that we haven\u2019t already seen before, but it has the chance to at least offer some true emotion behind the whole journey. Disney could have aimed for something in the vein of \u201cPan\u2019s Labyrinth\u201d but instead ride on a dull, hollow experience filled with CGI and silly characters we\u2019re supposed to root for. Even Jayden Fowora-Knight who plays the titular Nutcracker gets lost in the myriad eccentric heroes and villains, rather than standing out as the hero who aides Clara in saving his world.<\/p>\n

And I doubt many people will remember Morgan Freeman or Helen Mirren appeared in this, in a few years. \u00a0In any case, at least Tchaikovsky’s music is still incredibly beautiful, and there is a neat \u201cFantasia\u201d visual reference. It\u2019s just there is nothing really interesting or substantial that occurs throughout its entire (merciful) ninety minute run time; I doubt most of the target audience will be able to stay awake past the first half hour.<\/p>\n