Tim Burton has tackled almost all of the genre's, and done most of them very well. So who doesn't want to see him go back to his adventure-fantasy comfort zone with Miss Peregrine?
It's billed as Tim Burton's X-Men, and I like that comparison a lot. It definitely has certain similarities to a mutant story, but with Burton's flare for obscurity and peculiarity. Let me start off by saying that I really liked the premise and set up. Not only are the characters similar to X-Men, but the story slightly resembled Days of Future Past. I love the time travel elements and links to World War II. But the rest of the film just didn't live up to the promise of the trailers.
As delightful as some of Burton's films can be, I find the unevenness to be one of his biggest detractors of his otherwise intriguing ideas. For some reason, the second half of his films don't have the same cohesiveness that the opening's do. With Miss Peregrine, we are set up with a much more grounded take to a heightened story than I thought. You certainly get to see the impressive and outright strange abilities of the young children, but it isn't taken into any extraordinary levels, until later. The second half is flooded with ridiculous and over-the-top 'peculiarities'. That's would be all fine and dandy if the first half didn't set up an already intriguing story without all of the added strangeness.
As for the performances, Eva Green is the only one that really stood out here. She seems like a perfect fit into a Burton-esque drama. Her line delivery and presence just speaks Burton. She's also the only character that kept my attention from beginning till end. Sadly, she's not really in it all that much, even with the title having her name. We mostly focus on Asa Butterfield's 'Jake' and Ella Burnell's 'Emma'. Of course, there is some romantic tension, but it never leaves the constructs of a typical teen angst drama. I just didn't buy into it.
There's a ton of cool things about this movie, but by the time I left the theater the whole idea just felt tiresome. But with all this said, I would still be open to another entry in the series, just include Eva Green a little more and don't fall into clichés, Burton. You're better than that.
+Premise
+Eva Green is perfect
-First and second half are completely different films
-Romantic chemistry was hard to buy into
5.9/10
