You don’t need me to tell you that as a society we are unhealthily addicted to digital devices – you’re reading this review on one (though please don’t put it down until you’ve got to the end). It is our increasing digital enslavement which is the central theme of director Ben Gregor and scriptwriter Simon Farnaby’s much anticipated reimagining of Enid Blyton’s most surreal books – and to heighten the message the production largely eschews the sort of high-tech, AI-generated special effects which are sadly ubiquitous in modern filmmaking.
As the writer behind both Wonka and Paddington 2, Farnaby is an old hand at bringing children’s classics to the big screen. His customary wit is writ large over his latest project, so much so the film could possibly be rechristened The Magic Farnaby Tree. One so-bad-it’s-good gag which he reserves for himself in his role as the film’s resident country-bumpkin farmer particularly stands out. I won’t spoil the punchline but it is a play on the word “wifi” – and is quite frankly the sort of broad(band) humour which should be broadly banned. Despite such knockabout fare, this is not a movie which can be dismissed as lightweight. Indeed, it is in some ways less children’s film and more state-of-the-nation address.
Cue the dysfunctional Thompson family, the film’s protagonists. Tim (Andrew Garfield doing Andrew Garfield things), is a stay-at-home dad with a fondness for wine and pasta who at the outset of the picture is told by his futuristic-fridge designer wife, Polly (Claire Foy doing Claire Foy things), that she has quit her lucrative job for ethical reasons.
The eternally optimistic Tim sees the news as an opportunity to chase one of the couple’s dreams: to go and live off the land back where he grew up in the English countryside while he simultaneously pursues a career as an artisanal pasta-sauce maker. Polly is persuaded by the plan but their three digitally addled children are less enamoured of it, particularly when it transpires they will be made to do without the internet – akin to being without oxygen for the young Thompsons.
Oldest child Beth (Delilah Bennett-Cardy), a teenage influencer in the making, is particularly horrified, while video game addict Joe (Pheonix Laroche) is left so bereft he even resorts to creating a facsimile console out of cardboard. The hardest to read of the Thompson progeny is the youngest, Fran (Billie Gadsdon), who for the first part of the film remains practically mute, the implication being she is in a digitally induced stupor. While all three children essentially represent caricatures in order to hammer home the film’s wider point, the lack of subtlety in no way jars.
Upon arriving in the countryside, it is Fran who first finds herself under the tree’s enchanted canopy and reciting "I believe in magic" three times to unveil the tree and its eclectic inhabitants: Angry Pixie (Hiran Abeysekera), Moonface (Nonso Anozie), Saucepan Man (Dustin Demri-Burns), Mr Watzisname (Oliver Chris), Dame Washalot (Baby Reindeer's Jessica Gunning) and the human-sized fairy, Silky (the endlessly watchable Nicola Coughlan). Soon Fran is whisked up into one of the singular orbiting lands above the tree where she nearly gets stuck in the Land of Goodies. Despite the close call, the tree’s effect on Fran is transformative, as it is too on the cynical Beth and distracted Joe when they reluctantly come with her the next time she visits.
Above the magical tree, the principal threat comes from a principal, Dame Snap (formerly Slap before political correctness intervened), a Victorian-style headmistress who wishes permanently to imprison children in school. The role is tackled with relish by a snaggle-toothed Rebecca Ferguson, whose adroitness at playing a cartoonish baddie is as much of a revelation as her vertiginous hairstyle. So much so, in fact, the film errs by not giving her greater screentime and really fashioning the sort of jeopardy that is provided by the Child Catcher in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
Down on the ground, the villainy comes in the form of Jennifer Saunders – oddly choosing to deploy an ambiguous German-style accent – who plays the unspeakably awful Grandma Thompson. You’ll have to watch the film to find out what happens, but I’m spoiling little when I say things (sauce)pan out in the end.
Whether intentional or not, Farnaby’s conversion of the source material into a parable for our times is somewhat subversive. After all, Enid Blyton wasn’t exactly concerned with critiquing society. However, if Blyton does have a thread which runs through her wondrous canon, it’s the empowerment of children. In Blyton’s world, children aren’t constrained by the mundane, practical or, indeed, real. Whether freeing her juvenile protagonists to embark on fantastical adventures up the Magic Faraway Tree, or to solve baffling mysteries on Kirrin Island, she appeals to that whimsical hallmark of childhood: anything is possible if you can imagine it. The Magic Faraway Tree serves as a salutary reminder that we must protect this hallmark at all costs. Say it after me: “I believe in magic”.
It's all very well and good hearing the thoughts of an adult on The Magic Faraway Tree but it's much more important to get the perspective of someone at whom the film is primarily targeted. Here, my daughter Soren Kiek gives her verdict...
It was tree-mendous having the honour to see the film. It was unbelievably imaginative and creative, and had the brilliant moral that the internet isn't everything and that you should enjoy magic and nature more!
My favourite characters were Fran, Silky and Moonface because they did some astonishing acting and were very good at exposing their feelings. The costumes were also incredible: there were forest-green ones, sparkly pink ones and some really funny ones too.
Now we need to talk about the lands. There are lots of lands in the clouds but my favourite was the Land of Goodies with treats of any kind. There were also some funny lands like the Land of Birthdays where all your wishes come true – just don't choose silly ones or they might stick to you like glue.
So that's the magic of the Magic Faraway Tree, and it's waiting for you to come too...
