BRIAN VINER on The Magic Faraway Tree: Blyton’s magical tale is a ripping treat for Easter

The Magic Far Away Tree (U, 110 minutes)

Evaluation:

Verdict: Oak-solid family treat

Splitsville (15, 104 minutes)

Evaluation:

Verdict: Hit-and-run comedy

My children are all grown up now, but my wife and I still vividly remember the wonderful pleasure of introducing them, when they were little, to the same stories that fascinated us 30-odd years ago. I must add that I got nowhere with my beloved Jennings books. It turns out that Linbury Court prep school is no rival to Hogwarts.

But Enid Blyton made a more successful leap between generations. The Malory Towers novels, which did no better than Jennings, have become all that irrelevant. But our kids, just like us, were fascinated (and sometimes terrified) by the wonderful antics of the Faraway Tree series. So, to put it in Blyton-ese, how impressive it is to see these characters on the big screen after all these years.

The Magic Faraway Tree is directed by Ben Gregor, whose work is mostly in television. The writer is Simon Farnaby, whose impressive feature film history includes the hilarious Paddington 2 (2017) and who is also a master of the tricky art of pleasing children and adults alike. Both (more from Blyton) did a truly magnificent job. At least by finding a modern, relatable context for stories published in the 1940s.

The top-notch cast, led by Claire Foy and Andrew Garfield, is the icing on the cake. At the beginning of the film, Polly Thompson (Foy) has quit her high-paying job as an appliance inventor on principle (listen for the talking refrigerator). She and her kindly, if hapless, husband, Tim (Garfield), are forced to give up their comfortable city lifestyle and decide to take advantage of it by moving to a remote, dilapidated barn in the hopes of immersing their three children in nature.

It’s a challenge. The eldest, Beth (Delilah Bennett-Cardy), is a sullen, stubborn teenager who talks about the ‘oppression of the patriarchy’, and her younger brother Joe (Phoenix Laroche) is in thrall to gaming devices. Blyton will be scratching his head rather than turning in his grave.

Pictured left to right: Nicola Coughlan, Billie Gadsdon and Dustin Demri-Burns, who also starred in the film

But he knew the youngest, Fran (even though he called her Fanny). Fran (Billie Gadsdon) is an elective mute recognized by the imaginative fairy Silky (Nicola Coughlan), and although Tim and Polly are thrilled when their daughter starts talking again, they have no idea what has shaken her out of her silence. He is soon introduced by Silky to a huge tree in the nearby forest; this tree is said to have been dangerously fascinated by the otherwise mostly inscrutable farmer (a hilarious cameo by Farnaby, who keeps one of the film’s best jokes, a nonsense about Wi-Fi, to himself).

As book lovers will remember, this magical tree is inhabited by many fantastic characters, including Moon Face (Nonso Anozie), Saucepan Man (Dustin Demri-Burns), Mr. Watzisname (Oliver Chris) and Dame Washalot (Jessica Gunning). It also moves Fran, and over time her siblings, alternately to a series of countries. These include magic, beauty, back-to-front transitions and fine cameos from know-it-alls from Lenny Henry, Michael Palin and Simon Russell Beale.

Meanwhile, Tim is growing tomatoes downstairs and plans to commercialize his homemade pasta sauce. It’s a venture that’s in danger from events up in the distant treetop, but you won’t find any spoilers here; It’s just a tremendous endorsement for a picture of enormous appeal, which, although singular, carries distinct echoes of other great children’s films such as Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968) and Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971).

Just like these two classics, wholesomeness is tempered with genuine darkness; Rebecca Ferguson stars as the evil headmistress Dame Snap, and Jennifer Saunders plays the Teutonic businessman grandmother whom the children forbid. But there’s nothing that will give your angels nightmares like Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’s terrifying Child Catcher. Perfectly timed for the Easter holidays, Magic Faraway Tree is an oak-heavy family treat.

Image: Dakota Johnson as Julie in Splitsville

Splitsville also takes us back to movies from 50 or 60 years ago; but this time I’m thinking of sex and relationship comedies like Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969). It was written by Kyle Marvin and Michael Angelo Covino and directed by the latter. They also star as best friends Carey (Marvin) and Paul (Covino), who are married to Ashley (Adria Arjona) and Julie (Dakota Johnson), respectively.

The film explores the phenomenon of ‘open’ marital relationships in a resolutely cheerful manner, with one-liners and moments of pure joke that are slightly hit and miss. It’s never as funny as its writers think it is or its insistent jazz score suggests, but it moves along engagingly enough that any script that includes jokes about Abraham Lincoln, Walt Disney, Malcolm Gladwell, Meatloaf, and Tom Cruise’s vanity project Vanilla Sky can’t be that bad.

Also showing…

Another week, another horror movie. Whatever the common name is – perhaps a ghost or a slash – they keep coming. I’m told this is because horror is a genre favored by Generation Z, ages 16 to 25, and the industry is desperate to attract them to the movies.

Anyway, last week we watched Ready Or Not 2 which was bloody fun and this week They Will Kill You (15, 94 minutes, two out of five stars)which it is not. It’s a comedy-horror movie where a moderately tense story devolves into abject stupidity very quickly.

Zazie Beetz plays Asya, who runs away from her abusive father but is consumed with guilt for leaving her sister in his ‘care’. After being captured and imprisoned ten years after trying to kill him, she sets out to find her long-lost brother, tracking him to a large Manhattan hotel run by a creepy cult.

They Will Kill You is a comedy-horror film (Zazie Beetz is pictured as Asia) in which a moderately tense story very quickly descends into abject stupidity.

Zazie Beetz plays Asya, who runs away from her abusive father but struggles with guilt for leaving her younger sister in his ‘care’ (Zazie Beetz is pictured as Asya)

Like Uma Thurman in the Kill Bill movies, Asia is well equipped to handle the creeps (played by Patricia Arquette and Tom Felton, among others), and soon all hell breaks loose. But the violence is so ridiculous, delivered with such ridiculous CGI, that ambitious director Kirill Sokolov, fueled by Tarantino, may seem increasingly deluded.

Violence in Two Russian-Speaking Prosecutors (12A, 118 minutes, four out of five stars) is mostly implied, but what a gripping, powerful and disturbing film it is, set in the Soviet Union in 1937, at the height of Stalinist terror, and brilliantly directed by the Ukrainian Sergei Loznitsa. I watched it at the Cannes Film Festival last year and it received one of the awards it deserved.

The film follows a young, fair-minded state prosecutor who gradually realizes that the principles of justice are no match for a corrupt regime in which ‘experts have been replaced by ignorant charlatans’. You can draw your own modern-day parallels.

All movies are in cinemas now.