THE NUTCRACKER AND THE FOUR REALMS
US, 2018, 99 minutes, Colour.
Mackenzie Foy, Keira Knightley, Helen Mirren, Morgan Freeman, Matthew Mc Fadyen, Jaden Fowora-Knight?, Omid Djalili, Jack Whitehall, Richard E.Grant, Meera Syal, Ellie Bamber, Eugenio Derbez, Misty Copeland.
Directed by Lasse Hallstrom, Joe Johnston.
There have been quite a number of versions of the Nutcracker story, animated, live action, based on the story by the Russian author, E.T.A. Hoffman, but, probably, the best-known version is that of Tchaikovsky, the Nutcracker Suite. In fact, while this story is based on Hoffman’s tale and the narrative tale for the Nutcracker ballet, there are excerpts from Tchaikovsky’s Suite throughout the film – not entirely integrated with the plot, just a number of excerpts now and then.
This film is rather like an over-rich Christmas cake. Plenty of ingredients, all mixed together, some very tasty, some that you would put aside, some where one wonders why they are there in the first place.
The film was codirected by Swedish director, Lasse Halstrom, who has been directing a wide range of films for the last 40 years, especially in the United States. He is joined by action director, Joe Johnston. One might wonder which sections were directed by which director.
While the opening has the look of London, the family has very Germanic names, and, once the audience is taken into the Four Realms, the main castle looks like the Cathedral of St Basil in Moscow.
Matthew Mc Fadyen is a rather stern father, mourning his wife, trying to make emotional contact with his grieving daughter, Clara (Mackenzie Foy) demanding that she go to a party celebration with her brother and sister and dance with her father. Instead, she goes to the basement, finding a friendly inventor (Morgan Freeman looking and sounding Americanly bizarre in this context), wanting to open the gift of a decorated egg from her dead mother. It has the key to her future – and, we guess, she will be guided to look into herself and her strengths. She is.
For most of the action, she is led into the Four Realms, encountering a sympathetic Captain, going down a hole which is immediately a reminder of Alice in Wonderland, encountering strange and I would characters and Sugar Plum, all eccentric sweetness and light, Keira Knightley. There are some revelations About Clara actually is, the identity of Clara’s mother, the effect of her leaving the Four Realms, and searing power struggles and Sugar Plum revealing sinister ambitions, bringing toy soldiers to life, mischievous mice, battles and some derring-do. And, Mother Ginger appears, played sympathetically by Helen Mirren.
All’s well and ends with but it has been something of a gluggy journey to get there.
1. A film for family audiences? A film for women and girls?
2. Tchaikovsky’s music and the excerpts played throughout the film? Apt? Background?
3. Hoffman’s story, the story forward Tchaikovsky’s ballet? 19th-century stories? Memories of Alice in Wonderland?
4. The setting, the scenes in London, the countryside, the forest, the camp for Realms of the castle, the interiors, the landscapes, mills, waterfalls? The castle resembling St Basil’s in Moscow? The Germanic names of the family – yet in London? An international mixture?
5. The strong cast, straightforward, exaggerated, caricatures?
6. The focus on the family, the Stern father, keeping up appearances, his relationship with his children, their getting ready to go out to the party? The death of the mother and the grief? A little boy and his energy? Louise and Clara? Clara and her grief, not wanting to go out, self-preoccupied, critical of her father? The dress, the coach, the promise of the dances?
7. The party, lavish, the dancing, the walls? Her going to the basement, meeting Dross on, Morgan Freeman (20th-century American)? His inventions, Clara fixing the mechanisms? The gift of the egg from her mother, unable to open it?
8. Her leaving the party, the encounter with the captain? Falling down the hole?
9. The Realms, the range of characters she met, Mother Ginger and the two attendants, the Tweedledum and Tweedledee characters? Sugar Plum? The story of Clara’s mother, the Queen, people deferring to her, wanting her to help them?
10. Travelling through the forest, the encounters with Mother Ginger, her appearance, manner, the seeming threat? The mouse and the stealing of the key? Opening the egg, mystified, seeing her reflection, her learning to rely on herself?
11. The ambitions of Sugar Plum, her manner, her wings, wanting power, condemnation of Clara’s mother? Her bringing to life the soldiers?
12. The battles, the soldiers, the captain and his resistance, the giant conglomeration of mice and their attack? Sugar Plum and her victory? The capture of Mother Ginger?
13. Clara, her enterprise with the captain, down the cliff, onto the mill, coming up into the castle? The buildup to the confrontation? The soldiers collapsing? The mechanical mice? The defeat of Sugar Plum? Liberation of Mother Ginger?
14. Clara returning, reconciliations her father, the dance with her father?
