Finding "Neverland" - 'in search of a wonderful place'; a hideout, a heartbreak, a respite, and a motivation

Rating: 8/10 (16 November 2014)

It was Albert Einstein who once said, "Imagination is more important than knowledge; for knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand."
Finding "Neverland" - 'in search of a wonderful place'; and the pursuit actually took me places. Freddie Highmore and Johnny Depp have outlived their characters to transpire the experience of such journeys to the minds of viewers.
Over the years, 'objective' in literature, just like our lives, has grown so much that people have forgotten what fun and at times - 'education of wisdom' - is fantasizing. Based on the life of J.M. Barrie and on the events leading to his creation of Peter Pan, this film gently reminds us of the joy and the gifts of imagination.
However, an essential question arose around its middle - "Why imagine good things, and dream for better when in reality all we'll receive is disdain and disappointment from life?" The reason being - because life's hard, and indeed,'realism' is necessary and should transpire in our minds as we grow up; however, our hopes shall not fade away because in the end, what matters is that how honestly we trusted ourselves to make it less hard and more pleasant with our loved ones, with our work, and most essentially with 'ourselves'. Maybe that's what was tried to be emulated around the film's climax.
Marc Forster (Director; "Stranger Than Fiction", "Quantum of Solace") quite meticulously made this film into an "imaginarium" of sorts, where imagination was the motivation to hope and to be resilient. The screen writing by David Magee(Screenplay, "Life of Pi") was nothing less than "enchanting", and so was the film's editing by Matt Chesse, a frequent collaborator of Forster. The casting of the film was another plus; Kate Winslet playing the ailing mother was quite moving.
Surprisingly, in its crux the film talks of 'growing up' while speaking of "the undying spirit of youth"... Maybe that's what maturing is and more so - growing wiser. To quote from another popular film... "If its not good, its not the end"... And I would like to "hope" so.