‘Paddington In Peru’: Review

Dir. Dougal Wilson. UK/France 2024. 105mins.

As marmalade-sandwich motion pictures go, Paddington In Peru is completely palatable however one thing of a thin-shred grocery store variant, fairly than the chunky, chewy artisanal delights that had been Paddington (2014) and the even higher Paddington 2 (2017). Taking Michael Bond’s inquisitive ursine hero out of London and again to his jungle roots, this can be a brisk journey romp boasting a status forged together with Olivia Colman and Antonio Banderas, and lavish manufacturing values – notably breathtaking Colombian and Peruvian areas, together with UNESCO World Heritage web site Macchu Picchu.

 The least placing of the sequence thus far

Shiny as it’s, the movie – directed by Dougal Wilson, taking up from Paul King – is neither fairly as winsome not as parent-pleasingly subtle because it units out to be. It falls wanting each the wit and the canny all-audiences attraction of the earlier episodes, which grossed over $268 million and $227 million respectively. Even so, Paddington in Peru will unfailingly tickle household audiences together with smaller youngsters – hair-raising thrills and ‘gentle peril’ however – when it opens within the UK on November 8, with China subsequent month and a wider worldwide rollout within the New 12 months. 

Together with one thing of an origin story for its furry hero (voiced as ever by Ben Whishaw), the movie begins with a prequel displaying him as a cub in Peru, out to seize a juicy orange, solely to take a dangerous tumble by means of foliage and down river – and rescued by his adoptive Aunt Lucy (voiced by Imelda Staunton). Years later, again in London, his loving hosts Mr and Mrs Brown (Hugh Bonneville and Emily Mortimer, the latter taking up from Sally Hawkins) anticipate an empty nest as their youngsters Judy (Madeleine Harris) and Jonathan (Samuel Joslin) become older. However a letter from the nun (Olivia Colman) who runs Peru’s House for Retired Bears sounds an alarm about Lucy – so the Brown household, together with housekeeper Mrs Chicken (Julie Walters) cross the Atlantic to see what’s up. 

There ensues a journey up the Amazon, accompanied by rakish riverboat captain Hunter Cabot (Antonio Banderas). What follows ticks off the acquainted equipment of South American journey – rope bridges, rickety planes, mysterious inscriptions, a misplaced temple. A large rolling rock is a nudge at Indiana Jones, and Banderas’s arrival on his boat, blasting out classics on a classic gramophone, carries echoes of Fitzcarraldo – however typically the movie performs its laughs straight fairly than for cinephile winks.

Early on, we study that Mr Brown’s insurance coverage agency has been taken over by an American firm, and the motto is now ’Embrace threat’. That’s the blueprint for a movie that’s brasher and extra thrill-oriented than its predecessors – but it surely additionally suggests a hard-nosed company strategy that dilutes the sequence’ attraction. The place earlier director Paul King favoured a glance of manifest toybox-style illusionism, new helmer Dougal Wilson – an promoting and music-video veteran – takes a much less flip, extra impersonal blockbuster strategy. The script is by Mark Burton, a long-time Aardman hand, and Jon Foster and James Lamont, the duo behind TV’s Whishaw-voiced animation sequence The Adventures of Paddington (with King and his collaborator Simon Farnaby listed within the story credit score). The narrative performs the twists and turns of the hunt to purposeful impact, however with few actual surprises. 

It’s a pleasure to see and listen to the returning regulars; the perfectly-synched match between Whishaw’s candid supply and the CGI bear’s facial expressions continues to be the sequence’ unifying thread. Nevertheless, because the Browns’ now adolescent progeny, Madeleine Harris and Samuel Joslin are under-used, as is Mortimer’s appealingly level-headed Mrs Brown – though one misses Sally Hawkins’ spiky eccentricity within the position. 

There should absolutely be Olivia Colman followers on the market who’ve all the time dreamed of seeing her as a guitar-playing nun, they usually gained’t be upset by her mischievous channeling of the Julie Andrews archetype, gamely dishing out grins. Antonio Banderas, nonetheless, is grossly indulged as a swaggering, sinister however bumbling trickster haunted by his gold-hungry ancestors, together with a deranged conquistador. He brings extra bluster than grace to the position(s) – and critically, fairly than a Spanish star, couldn’t the manufacturing have risked a significant Latin American title because the villain (e.g. Ricardo Darin or Alfredo Castro)? 

With a short coda that’s notably cheekier than all that precedes it, Paddington in Peru just about delivers what the poster guarantees. Older youngsters will admire the brisker tempo and peril, so the general technique could also be a wise business transfer – however that is the least placing of the sequence thus far. And given the earlier episodes’ emphasis on cultural range, the movie reveals treasured little curiosity within the tradition or the inhabitants of its chosen setting – other than a short shot of Paddington posing with indigenous youngsters.