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The movie Christopher Robin is about the adult life of a once-charismatic and loving child named Christopher Robin, who has now become a more business-centric adult.
Christopher Robin was released in theaters on Aug. 3, 2018. The movie opens with a young Christopher running around and having fun with his friends in the Hundred Acre Wood. The story changes tone dramatically as Christopher leaves the woods, after which point and the movie mainly focuses on the adult life of Christopher. Instead of the expected light-hearted kids movie that brings nostalgia to an older crowd, this movie is full of scenes that are oddly dark.
In one scene, all of the creatures in the Hundred Acre Wood go missing except for Pooh and Christopher. This scene is staged with heavy fog and gives off a very eerie feeling to the viewer since the scene mainly focuses on the fear of the unknown. Aside from the dark scenes in the movie, there are a lot of scenes without the animals from Hundred Acre Wood. Compared to the classic Winnie the Pooh stories, this is an unexpected choice. Surprisingly, most of the run time in the movie is just about Christopher Robin being more focused on his work as an adult than he is his family.
The message that Disney shadows over the entire movie is that the good memories from a childhood that one says will never be forgotten, can easily be forgotten once that one grows up. Most of the run time is spent showing how Christopher Robin has changed from a lovable (and fun-loving) kid to an adult who has a family and thinks work is more important than anything. The entire movie as a whole balanced serious and adorable scenes very well; the lighting conveyed perfectly the tone of each scene, the CGI on the animals was extremely realistic and the acting was impeccable. The characters—even small characters—are given enough screen time for the audience to really understand their character and who they are.
For example, there is a character whose only purpose is to annoy Christopher Robin about playing a card game called “Gin Rummy” any time that this character sees Christopher. Just in the scenes with this character, you can see how Christopher genuinely wants to avoid him. It’s small things like this that add so much to this movie. These moments show how Christopher has changed into an adult from the child who only loved to have fun. Christopher Robin only cares about the business that he runs; even when his family proposes something fun to do, he turns it down because his job is more important.
This movie wasn’t intended to be for kids, even though it’s made by Disney. It was made for the teenagers and adults that grew up with the stories of Christopher Robin and the animals of Hundred Acre Wood. You can go into this movie having little-to-no knowledge of the Winnie the Pooh stories and enjoy it just fine. Still, it’s the nostalgia that creates the full effect the movie is supposed to have on the viewer.
This movie is currently still in theaters and should be out on streaming services in the next six months.
