A Wrinkle in Time : Movie Review


A Wrinkle in Time (2018) - Movie Poster
A sumptuous, largely faithful adaptation of Madeleine L'Engle's classic 1962 fantasy novel, "A Wrinkle in Time" bursts forth with idiosyncratic visual wonders and passionate, deep-seated messages of self-worth. As a filmmaker, Ava DuVernay (2014's "Selma") brings everything she's got to the projects she works on. The proof is up on the screen and in the empowering fabric of the material. Jennifer Lee (2013's "Frozen") and Jeff Stockwell's (2007's "Bridge to Terabithia") screenplay must have been challenging to crack, but it, too, holds a modern-day immediacy which somehow proves both timeless and specifically a product of the here and now. Watching the film in all its oddball, ungainly glory, taking our protagonists across space and time to idyllic utopias and foreboding places of evil, one imagines it cannot be far off from what a David Lynch family feature might look like.


It has been four years since 13-year-old Meg Murry's (Storm Reid) beloved astrophysicist father Dr. Alex Murry (Chris Pine) mysteriously disappeared. As hope in finding him has begun to dwindle, Meg's bright inner light has also dimmed considerably. Her grades have dropped, she has trouble fitting in with her peers, she must constantly contend with bullying classmate Veronica (Rowan Blanchard), and she immediately discounts any compliment she receives. It is a dark and stormy night when the curious Mrs. Whatsit (Reese Witherspoon), claiming to be a friend of Meg's prodigious 6-year-old brother Charles Wallace (Deric McCabe), shows up in their home, confirming to Meg's bewildered mother, Dr. Kate Murry (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), that there is such a thing as a tesseract. Before he went missing, Alex had been close to a scientific breakthrough proving that people need only their minds to create a portal through which they can travel to other planets in other galaxies. Guided by the three shape-shifting Mrs.—the cheerful, unfiltered Mrs. Whatsit, the quotation-reciting Mrs. Who (Mindy Kaling), and the sage-like Mrs. Which (Oprah Winfrey)—Meg, Charles Wallace, and Meg's classmate Calvin (Levi Miller) will embark on an adventure across the cosmos to find their dad. Danger lurks on their journey, however, in the form of an invading evil known as The It.


See Dustin Putman, TheFilmFile.com. for full review

Author : Dustin Putman, TheFilmFile.com.