Review of Peter Rabbit (2018) by Thequietgamer — 03 May 2018

Fares much better than Sony Pictures Animation's previous two live-action/3D animation hybrids, the critically maligned "Smurfs" movies. That's mostly due to how rambunctiously energetic it is. Our furry, troublemaking protagonist regularly gets himself mixed up in over-the-top situations. Luckily for him and us Peter Rabbit always has more than a few quips and tricks up his sleeve. Any other rabbit who ticked off humans this much would surely end up dead.

There are some surprisingly dark elements to this family movie. Peter and his fluffy family have a tragic backstory of lost parents and the film makes no attempts to hide the fact that one of them was eaten from the children watching. We even witness someone straight-up die onscreen. Almost the entire plot centers around the new neighbor trying to kill the title character and his cohorts.

The rest is as light-hearted as you would expect. Peter's conflict with Domhnall Gleeson is brimming with comic mischief and a level of cartoon slapstick violence I haven't seen since an episode of Tom and Jerry. Characters find themselves in all sorts of dangerous situations and showdowns, but are never really at any risk. The morals of the film kind of fall short for me as I never really saw Peter to be as much at fault as Gleeson's character, despite the movie telling he was. I enjoyed that the side-characters got their time to make us laugh instead of being overshadowed by the stars. Overall, I found it be a very enjoyable children's flick. One with the potential to entertain older audiences as well.

7.