Review of Pan (2015) by Wesley B — 11 Oct 2015

Pan had great cinematography, environment, and costumes, but lacked the story to support it. There were far too many plot slip-ups and too many poorly-written characters to make for a good origin story.

In the beginning of the film, we hear a narrator telling us about how "friends will become enemies," so the audience expects a story about how the friendship between Peter and Hook was shattered. How is Hook going to backstab Peter? Will Peter betray Hook? We never find out. All we are left with is about 30 seconds at the end of the film "hinting" about their doomed friendship. Peter says something along the lines of "We'll always be friends! What could go wrong?" This was probably one of the biggest flaws in the film for me.

There are a few other missed points in the movie as well. For example, how did Hook lose his hand? Why is there only a few minutes of screen time for Tinkerbell? Wasn't she a fairly key character in the original? You would think for an origin story, they would try to cover as many points as possible, but...this movie desperately failed in that department.

There were also quite a few odd parts in the film. Like the scene where the orphan boys arrive to Neverland, for example. Why are the pirates singing Nirvana? I mean, it sounds awesome, don't get me wrong-but why? It doesn't seem to fit very well with Neverland. And Blackbeard's scene where he uses the fairy dust to make himself younger looks an awful lot like the procedure of a meth addict's high. Some sort of fairy meth? Alrighty then.

Not to mention that weird "romance" between Hook and Tiger Lily. Did we really need that? They hardly had much interaction and then they were just sort of...together? I know Disney has a habit of pairing characters up only a few days after they meet, but this was just ridiculous.

I'm not going to say too much on the issue of Tiger Lily's casting, since we've all heard it before, but it was a bad move. There were plenty of great actresses to choose from, and Rooney should not have one of them.

I did, however, enjoy Hugh Jackman's performance. He managed to convey Blackbeard's coniving and antagonistic ways well, despite being in such a downhill movie. Also, the cinematography was pleasing to look at, but a little less CGI would have been nice. The costumes were excellent as well.

The movie had nice visuals and some good acting here and there, but the plotline was awfully written and there was zero effort put into the characters. If you want a bland storyline and effortless characters, then go see this movie.