Review of Into the Woods (2014) by Evgeniy Gal F — 13 Jul 2015

Initially interesting, the story draws you in. Only it fails to reach a point or teach some clever lesson, and regrettably does not really entertain the viewer.

Some of the actors are very good. They might have made this movie good, but didn't. The songs as standalone singles are funny enough, but again they fail to create a good musical. Something here clearly did not connect.

In this case, the trend to mix lots of fairytales takes a dark turn, and not in the good way. It really turns into a big mess.

I am against this concept in general, except one example where Happily Never After actually made it work. But here the writers seem to make no attempt to connect the dots and find a way to make the stories work together. The baker is obviously what should have been the centre of the story and he has no real connection to the stories happening around him, completely outside the storyline.

A handful of stories that could make great movies in their own right, like Maleficent, cannot turn into a good movie when you try and fuse them into one.

With such a great group of actors the writers had potential to do anything. Instead, you can see world class actors working on a very poor quality story.

In the age issue the movie fails yet again. On the one hand it is too mature in its approach to pain and death, as well as far too long for kids. On the other hand, it is not very entertaining for adults either, missing some clever idea or a plot twist that would draw us in.

Effects are not very good and all in all, the movie is a big flop.

I have to give it a D rather than an F, only thanks to the great actors.