Mirrormask

Helena is a teenager who lives and works in a circus (her parent's circus to be precise). Unlike the many children wishing to run away and join it, she's sick of living in one and wants to join real life. But when her mother falls ill, she soon finds herself in a strange dreamworld made up of her many drawings and sketches, and needs to find a way to save her before the whole world is destroyed.

This is a movie that can be tough to love, but worth the effort. It's got some problems (as I will discuss below), but there's something almost magical about it, something extra, that really hooks you in. Besides the British accents I mean (Mmmm, love those accents). In fact, it's mostly all in what you see.

This is easily one of the more visually-incredible movies I've ever seen. Helena's sketches (that cover a wall in her room, the hand-made get well cards she makes her mother, the roof of her apartment building...) are already pretty neat to look at, but when brought to life around her as an entire world... things get weird.

The style is also very neat. The film isn't trying to make the other world seem 100% real, since it's her dreamworld. And whenever you have a dream, even if you're not having a lucid dream, you can still slightly tell things are a bit off (or rather, when you think about them afterward). Here it's no different, with the buildings and people having something that's not quite there about them.

So, all stuff that has to be seen to be amazed. And all the various characters that show up are interesting enough people. But since Neil Gaiman is writing, that's hardly a surprise. The problems of the film, though, do come as something of a surprise.

It's two big things. One is how familiar a lot of the plot points will seem. If you've seen your standard fantasy movie, then you'll know how this one plays out (hence the surprise, coming from Gaiman. He should know better). And then there's stretches of the film that just feel dull. It's odd, since the visuals are still amazing and new here, but it just feels like it's going on and on. Like about twenty minutes could've been shaved off, no problem.

So, not a great movie, but a good one. It's still an awesome piece of fantasy, and fans of other things from the Jim Henson company should go for it.

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZF6oDkiiaFE