PETE’S DRAGON
Directed by David Lowery, with Bryce Dallas Howard, Robert Redford, Oakes Fegley, Oona Laurence, Wes Bentley and Karl Urban.
REVIEW: Michael Rechtshaffen
IN THE pantheon of beloved Disney classics, 1977’s Pete’s Dragon would never be mistaken for one of the studio’s crowning achievements.So when the studio announced plans for a reboot, there wasn’t the same outcry from fans that initially greeted news of recent remakes of Cinderella and The Jungle Book.
But despite there being ample room for improvement, the extensively reimagined Pete’s Dragon fails to breathe fresh life into the 40-year-old property. Directed by David Lowery, the notably darker interpretation turns out to be, like the CG creature itself, a moody, lumbering thing that seldom takes flight.
Relocating the original setting from coastal Maine to the tree-blanketed Pacific Northwest, the new version also dispenses with the old setup, instead placing young Pete (Oakes Fegley) alone in the woods following a tragic car accident that has killed both of his parents.
It turns out he doesn’t have to fend for himself very long, as he’s taken under the wing of a 24-foot, furry, sage-hued dragon he decides to name Elliot.
Fast-forward six years later. We find the now 10-year-old wild child and his dragon pal still happily ensconced in all that greenery when they’re both discovered by a forest ranger (Bryce Dallas Howard) and her boyfriend’s 11-year-old daughter (Oona Laurence).
One doesn’t need to have seen the 1977 version to know roughly where this is all headed, and that lack of any element of surprise is just one of the problems with the script. None of the emotional stakes have been planted deeply enough to elicit audience involvement in young Pete’s plight.
Meanwhile, Howard and a supporting cast haven’t been given much to do here beyond reacting to the mighty Elliot, who himself proves to hold all the allure of a dusty Disneyland animatronic. – Reuters/ Hollywood Reporter