strong performances

Rating: 8/10 (17 November 2005)

Johnny Depp gives one of his most subtle performances to date in "Finding Neverland," a film about the creative process that has a thing or two to say about the part imagination plays in all our lives. In this adaptation of the play by Allan Knee, Depp plays J.M. Barrie, the author who, in 1904, introduced the world to Peter Pan. According to the movie (though not necessarily reality), Barrie gleaned the inspiration for his creation from a beautiful young widow and her four sons whom he met one day in the park and with whom he forged a deep and lasting relationship (there are a few factual errors in that synopsis, but in the interest of keeping your confusion to a minimum, I'll recount the story as the movie presents it). In his endeavors to entertain the children, Barrie brought them into his world of magical make believe, eventually weaving the story of Peter Pan out of those experiences.
When we first meet Barrie, he is already a well-known and successful playwright in the London theater world - although his latest work has bored his audience and critics so thoroughly in its premiere performance that it is forced to close on opening night. Suffering from creative stagnation and stuck in a stifling marriage, Barrie eventually finds surcease and an outlet for his creativity with his new-found "family" from the park. However, even though the film technically takes place in the Edwardian Era, the iron hand of Victorian Era morality still holds England firmly in its icy grip. For soon rumors are flying not only about the "unseemly" relationship between Barrie and Mrs. Sylvia Llewelyn Davies, but even about the questionable and potentially sinister nature of Barrie's relationship with the boys.
Written by David Magee and directed by Marc Foster, "Finding Neverland" offers a touching, fascinating glimpse into the mind of a man in the process of creating one of the most enduring tales of modern literature. One of the marks of any "classic" work of inspiration - be it art, music, literature or drama - is that we are never aware of the nuts-and-bolts process that has gone into its creation. The greater the work, the more we are inclined to believe that it dropped fully formed from heaven, a rare gift from the gods that seems somehow always to have existed somewhere. That is certainly the case with "Peter Pan," which is why "Finding Neverland" provides such an invaluable service. It forces us to acknowledge that even the greatest of creations, which we tend to attribute to that mysterious and intangible entity known as "genius," are really the product of one part inspiration to two parts fortuitous timing and hard work. "Finding Neverland" flows effortlessly between the events as they happened in real life and the fantasy scenarios that Barrie eventually wove out of them to create his masterpiece. As a result, the movie itself has a kind of heightened fairy tale feel to it that works well in the context of the story. The movie also affords us an entertaining behind-the-scenes view of the creation of the play itself and a breathless recreation of its opening night.
In addition to Depp, the film is filled with fine performances by Kate Winslet as Sylvia, Julie Christie as her stern, disapproving mother, Dustin Hoffman as Barrie's sympathetic theater manager, and Radha Mitchell, as Barrie's cold, status-conscious wife. The four young actors who play the boys are also excellent, with Freddie Highmore, as the precocious and too-cynical-for-his-own-good Peter, a particular standout.
Historians may find room to quibble about some of the liberties the film takes with the facts. Sylvia was not a widow at the time of the story and her husband resented the intrusion of Barrie into their lives. Even one of the sons has been dropped. This is acceptable, however, since an over-cluttered plot would likely have robbed the film of the simplicity it needs to sustain its fairy tale ambiance. Moreover, the movie telescopes a number of key events to enhance their dramatic impact (i.e. his wife's affair with writer Gilbert Cannan, which is shown as being a contemporaneous event, actually occurred a number of years after this part of the story). But such nitpicking seems fruitless in the overall scheme of the film.
Was Peter Llewelyn Davies the real inspiration for Peter Pan or was it J.M. Barrie himself? The film doesn't answer that question, but it certainly hints at the distinct possibility of the latter. For Barrie was clearly a man who much preferred the warm fantasies of carefree childhood to the cold cynicism of responsible adulthood. And that, of course, has always been the heart and soul - as well as the life's blood - of his own paean to eternal youth, "Peter Pan."