Goodbye Christopher Robin – 4 out of 5
After watching the wonder and whimsy of Christopher Robin(you can read that review here), I decided to jump back to a film that came out a year before. Vastly different in tone and context, Goodbye Christopher Robin came at the story of that silly old bear from a biopic standpoint and tells the tale of how the story came to be. The one thing this one did have in common with the more whimsical Disney adventure is that it was very good at pulling at the heartstrings.
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| Silly old bear...seriously, though, get out of the tree, you'll get hurt. |
After returning from WWI, writer A.A. Milne (Domhnall Gleeson) returns a different man. He tries to resume his work but can’t quite get back into writing. He moves out to the country with his wife Daphne (Margot Robbie), his son Christopher Robin a.k.a. Billy Moon (Will Tilston) and the nanny Olive (Kelly Macdonald). After Olive has to leave to attend to some family business and Daphne returns to the city, Milne is left to care for his son on his own. While watching his son play with his stuffed animals and engaging in some imaginary adventures in the wooden area around the cottage, Milne is inspired to create a children’s story based on his son. The Winnie-the-Pooh books become a huge success but one that a young Christopher Robin Milne wasn’t prepared for.
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| If he can accept that haircut, he can accept the hardships that come with fame, amirite? That's right, I burned a small child and passive aggressively mocked his hairstyle. |
I hesitate to compare Goodbye Christopher Robin to Disney’s Christopher Robin because they are two different features. While I loved the child-like wonder that is Christopher Robin, I made sure to not have the same expectations with this one. This feature is a biopic that has a very somber tone that steers more towards the real emotions and drama rather than the heightened sensibilities of Disney’s magic and the movie truly excels at this. It was easy to get hooked into the unfolding narrative and drama and get emotionally invested in what was occurring. Whether this comes in the form of the highs as we see father and son having fun with each other and that sparking creation in the dad or whether it is Milne’s post-traumatic stress disorder caused by the war or Christopher Robin dealing with the hardships of growing up as a character in a children’s book. This movie really hits the emotions and drama well and does so with realism.
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| Other designs had Pooh with cybernetic arms and machine guns. |
One element that added to this realism is the performances. Domhnall Gleeson and Margot Robbie are both very talented performers. Gleeson really captured Milne’s struggle to return to life after the war and find the new subject he would write about. The two actors portraying Christopher Robin, Will Tilston as a child and Alex Lawther as an adult, were incredible to watch as they both encompass different eras of the man’s life and not just from an age perspective. I was really impressed seeing how the young Tilston handled the transition of a child at play with his father to a boy starting to realize that this life of a celebrity might not be what he needs. Finally, I really enjoyed the chemistry that Gleeson had with both actors and the dynamic portrayal of the father/son relationship.
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| "Son, we need to find a way to get our pants up higher. Let's aim for the armpits." |
The only drawbacks I had with the film are the exploration of Milne’s PTSD from the war and the pacing that concerns Christopher Robin’s development. Milne’s fear and anxiety that came back with him from the war has a place in the story but doesn’t feel as prevalent as the conflict should feel. It almost feels randomly used and it resolution comes about too quickly. Finally, a lot of the story concerns CR’s life as a child and the conception of the Winnie-the-Pooh story. So much energy and time is spent here that I believed that the entirety of the story would revolve around this time period, despite the feature beginning later in CR’s life. When Robin’s time as an adult arrives, it feels like it came and went very quickly when compared to the childhood section and it made the final act of the film feel rushed. Neither of these were entertainment killers but observations I held nonetheless.
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| Gleeson is a dynamite performer. I don't get tired of watching him work. |
Goodbye Christopher Robin tells a dramatic story about how a children’s book icon came about and how it may have instilled happiness and joy in millions of little ones but it also became a great burden for one boy and one he had to carry his entire life. The story is enthralling, the performances are fantastic and heart and drama is captivating. It has some minor issues concerning developments but, overall, it’s a touching and captivating biopic.
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