Neverland Again Safe for Children
FILM REVIEW by Kate Grace

I used to know a girl named Belle. Growing up, she was the child all other children looked to for fun. In grade school, she turned each recess into an adventure, better known as Spiders and Unicorns. The bell would ring, and while others fought over tetherball, a flock of kids would circle around her to learn what part they would play that day-a spider or a unicorn.

As a teenager, while other girls were pretending to be adults, she valued silliness. During a summer trip with our church's youth group, she organized a midnight outing of the Underwear Bandits, named appropriately after the (clean) underwear we wore over our heads to conceal our identities -- only one girl had packed a pair of nylons and she didn't want to be involved anyway, deciding our game was childish. We spent the night wandering around pretending, just as we had in grade school. It was the most fun we had that summer.

In high school, while other girls were concerned about hating themselves and the boys that didn't like them, Belle kept playing. She hosted murder mystery parties and belonged to an improv comedy group. She was a storyteller. She had the most horrific embarrassing moments out of everyone I knew, but unlike everyone I knew, she wore them like medals. The time she fell off the stage during a performance. The time she split her pants on stage in the middle of the lunchroom. The time she sliced her thumb while opening a coconut with a wine key, and how coincidentally the scar made her thumb look like a small butt-crack and all.

It's difficult to fully describe Belle with words because, where words fail, Belle began. The best I can give is this: While in Mexico, our translator approached us having just witnessed Belle reenact being stuck in her hammock as a bat flew circles around the school room she was staying in. Everyone stopped laughing as Sergio approached, recognizing his intent to say something important. He pointed at Belle and through broken English said, "You…you go to funeral…man in box stand up." We could tell by the look on her face that it was the greatest compliment she had ever received.

I lost contact with Belle the spring of my junior year in high school, and had occasionally wondered where she went and if she was still the same playful, silly girl who had prolonged our childhood. Through college, I thought about her less as time collected and distanced my present thoughts from those memories of playing and pretending. Now, being an adult with adult responsibilities, I think about her and how much fun we had rarely. It's amazing how serious we can take ourselves as adults-too serious, really.

This past week, I attended the New Yorker College Tour at the University of Michigan. I sat in seminars listening to New Yorker journalists speak about their craft and experience. I bought a ticket to the advanced screening of Finding Neverland where New Yorker film critic David Denby and the film's director, Marc Forster, would speak about all things intelligent after the film. I had intended to see the film when it was released, but had gone to the event solely to see smart adults talk about smart things. However, as it turns out, I left after the credits faded into black.

It may sound as if I disliked the film, but it's quite the opposite. I adored Finding Neverland. Through its dream-like imagery juxtaposed with the grainy, muted tones of an turn of the century reality, I was reminded of Belle and the games we played, the places we imagined and the adventures we had.

The film follows J. M. Barrie, played by Johnny Depp, as he befriends a group of young boys that become the inspiration for his infamous story, Peter Pan. While he spends his days playing with these children, his marriage is failing; the two lives create tension within the viewer. Naturally, it being a film, the viewers hope Barrie will choose his carefree, childlike nature over his obligations, because that is what they wish they could have done.

In a scene where tragedy sets into the boys' family, Barrie looks into the eyes of young George, the eldest of the boys, as he pleads with Barrie to help his family. In this moment, Depp's expression of remorse swiftly transitions into awe as he searches the boy's face and, before he speaks, the viewers know for what he is looking. George's boyhood has left him as if his innocence could be seen leaving his body-to Neverland.

While the credits rolled, I debated whether I should stay or go. I had paid more for this ticket than I would have at the cinema, but on the other hand, the film had brought Belle back from "Neverland" and I didn't know how long I would be able to hold on. I decided the value of vividly remembering our playfulness as children was greater than the risk of losing it to the smart talk of smart adults. I drove home smiling as the memories of our adventures swelled over me. That night, my dreams were delicious, but by morning the memory was already beginning to fade.

Although at first glance, Finding Neverland seems to be about a writer's process or the inspiration of a timeless tale, it's far simpler than this. It's about time and the effect it has on all of us. It's about the inevitable tragedy of losing a bit of us to Neverland, and the misfortune of memory. As a character in the film says, "We are all being followed by a ticking croc."

The innocence and beauty of a child is this: Whatever you can dream can be-nothing is out of grasp unless you stop reaching. This simplicity found in Belle, and all those like her, is what makes the man in the box stand up. It's the cynicism that comes with the ticking croc that makes us doubt the reach of our arm and, in the end, causes us to shorten our reach.

It was a wonderful feeling, for even just an evening, to revisit the belief in endless possibilities, believe what I dream can be and that it doesn't need to be lost. It was wonderful, even just for an evening, to visit Neverland.

| © 2004 The Outside World | website managed by // Chris Pummer |