Staying Shiny

My life as a Uber-geek in a Bridal world

Turning Back Time With Winnie The Pooh


I had the pleasure of taking my 2-year-old niece, Ms. A, to her first movie today.  Since she is a big Winnie the Pooh fan and so am I it seemed like a natural choice for her first trip to the movie theatre.  We both loved the movie!  Her first movie was a huge success.

I have to say that the choice to do this film in classic 2D animation was brilliant.  I got very nostalgic watching the pages of the book turn and the words being visible on the corners of the screen at various points in the movie.  I loved the way they blended A.A. Milne's original stories together the way the first Pooh film did.

Jim Cummings played Pooh and Tigger and was stupendous as ever.  Mind you, he's been playing these characters for years and has a voice acting history that spans countless years and amazing films.  Bud Lucky was new to the Eeyore voice and did a respectable job.  He captured the gloominess of Eeyore, but I could tell it was a new Eeyore voice right away.  John Cleese was a fantastic narrator and I particularly enjoyed the scene at the beginning where he tries to get Pooh out of bed.

However, there were a few things that I really didn't like in the film.  Craig Ferguson as Owl was very disappointing.  I understand movie companies wanting to included big name voices in films to sell more tickets, but in this case I felt it wasn't needed.  It's Winnie the Pooh!  People will see it for that reason alone.  I felt this version of Owl was missing his smug, yet very innocent superiority.  He came across as, well, kind of a dick.  He was the cause of most of the confusion in the film and it almost came across as though he was aware that he had messed up instead of being genuinely ignorant of his faults.  I don't blame Ferguson for this.  I think it was a poor casting choice and a bit of bad writing.  They really didn't need to hammer the "Back Soon/Backson" joke down the kids throats.  I think the point of Pooh for the young ones is figuring things out with the characters and seeing how their imaginations can take them on crazy and silly adventures.  I also wasn't the biggest fan of newcomer Jack Boulter as Christopher Robin.  Maybe I'm too much of a nostalgic fool, but I really think they didn't need to mess with the perfection of the original film.

Overall, this was a great movie.  I will watch it again and probably again.  It was a great first film for my "Auntie" date and a nice return to my childhood for an hour and ten minutes.  Stay for the credits, the pictures are worth it.

8 honeypots out of 10

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