Kids in London - Spiderwick Chronicles at Imax

KimT's London for Kids Blog

With the miserable Easter weather, a trip to the Imax seemed like a good remedy especially as both of my kids had been impressed with the trailers for this film.

But I am afraid that the trailers pretty much showed all the best bits. My ten year old thought the film was ok - particularly the flower fairies that we glimpsed on a few occasions. But then she has had a fairy fixation for a long time.

My 16 year old son (ok, he's not the target market for these sorts of films anymore but he generally comes along on occasions as a family outing) was less impressed - using his media studies skills to identify elements from the similar Bridge to Terabithia, Golden Compass and the far more successful Harry Potter movies (but there are boggarts in Harry Potter he said. But there are all manner of creatures in Harry Potter that were in lots of much older and more traditional stories I retorted - does the youth of today think that J K Rowling invented witches and wizards?).

Anyway. The Spiderwick Chronicles, I am reliably informed by my daughter, is a series of many, many books and this first film - about the Field Book of Fairies was the first in the series. I don't think we will be going to subsequent films though.

So the story is this, mum and three kids (including a fencing elder sister and identical twins played by the same actor - and you've got it, one good and one bad character) move into creepy old house from where the previous owner - mad Great Aunt Lucy - has only recently been removed into mental institution because, yes you got it, she thought her Dad had been taken away by the fairies. Actually, sprites within dandelion seeds (isn't this a theme from the latest Dr Seuss film - doesn't anyone have any original storylines any more?).

So. Pretty much as soon as they arrive they start to hear strange noises and discover a house goblin thing that looks like an albino hairless rat when happy (having eaten lots of honey) and a nasty green goblin when cross. His job is to guard the field book - which of course our hero reads and then has to protect from the mean old goblins (who they fight with tomato sauce - were Heinz the hidden sponsors?) when they cross the protective circle around the house.

There's a great pig like creature who is easily distracted by birds (which he eats) and a pretty ghoulish main monster who is trying to get the book (very young kids may be distressed at some of the chase scenes - but it's all good fun really).

Although the arrival of a griffin took me way into Harry Potter land, I have to say that the scenes of the kids racing across the skies and just skimming the tops of the trees on his back were quite exciting. And the big Imax screen actually helped here (I don't think otherwise the film was particularly helped by being on the big screen).

So. The film was ok for adults and quite exciting for those aged 6 to ten. But what made the day for us was not the average pizza we ate at the Strada restaurant but watching the large crowd of people who had gathered at the Royal Festival Hall Clore Ballroom to participate in what looked like a mass ballroom dancing lesson. We watched for quite some time and admired the experts and novices alike have a thoroughly fun time.

Posted Date
Mar 25, 2008 in KimT's London for Kids Blog by KimT