Visuals are this film's shining achievement

Rating: 7/10 (4 February 2013)

Anytime you come into a movie having already read the book it is based on you will have biases. It's rather unavoidable. I did read the book beforehand, and I did the best to avoid pointing out all of the differences in my head, because to do that is to just ruin the movie for myself, when I should just give it a chance. Now, anytime a book has fantastic places or scenes, there is eager anticipation to see it realized visually. This movie delivers on that front and creates scenes rather similar to how I thought they would be and other times make them even greater. What is really missing from the movie is some of the details and stories early on about the zoo animals which was really my favorite part of the book, but it is very understandable that these are missing in favor of the larger events of the main story. I believe ultimately any short coming in the movie was also a short coming of the book's narrative: the way it drags a little in the middle and the surprising ambiguity in the ending leave something to be desired. The book is better, but you can get by with just checking out the film.