Christopher Robin (2018)

One can well be forgiven for mixing this up with Goodbye Christopher Robin (2017). It even includes the latter's titular phrase more than once. But this Disney feature concerns only the fictional authority figure of the 100 Aker Wood, not the real-life son of author A.A. Milne.

Christopher leaves his stuffed animal friends behind when he goes to boarding -- or, as they would put it, "boring" -- school. After a whirlwind tour of his life thereafter, we find him (now played by Ewan McGregor) an efficiency manager with ironically little time for non-work, much to the displeasure of his wife (Hayley Atwell) and daughter (Bronte Carmichael). When a live Winnie the Pooh (voiced by Jim Cummings as usual) finds him again and asks for help finding the rest of their friends, Christopher can only take it as a nervous breakdown from overwork, but for his own peace of mind, he pays a visit to his old stomping grounds. Initially, he plans only to drop Pooh off, but it's hard to shake off sentimentality altogether.

Yeah, all the classic characters show up. Brad Garrett still makes a great Eeyore voice, and Cummings continues to do Tigger as well as Pooh. The rest have new talent, all at least passable: Piglet (Nick Mohammed), Rabbit (Peter Capaldi), Owl (Toby Jones), Kanga (Sophie Okonedo), and Roo (Sara Sheen). I shouldn't have to tell you what their personalities are like. As for CG appearances, only Rabbit and Owl look pretty much like real animals; the others have a typical old-fashioned stuffy texture. None exhibit vibrant colors, probably because those would look a little too out of place.

Pooh remains the most interesting, and not just because he gets easily the most lines. Decades have done nothing to reduce his naivety or clumsiness, much to Christopher's chagrin, but Benjamin Hoff taught me to recognize Pooh's wisdom in simplicity, and it shines through. Almost every time he speaks, he reveals a very different understanding of the world from grown-up Christopher, and it takes the latter a while to appreciate anew.

If you've long seen these animals as alive only in Christopher's mind, then the second half of this flick may throw you for a loop: Unlike Hobbes, they can move and talk in front of anyone. They also don't realize that most humans would freak out upon witnessing this. Fortunately, they tend to assume a sedate demeanor when transported, so only a handful of people notice.

Kiddie? A bit, especially by the climax with its unconvincing adult behavior, but still less so than any other Disney Pooh outing to my knowledge. Figure a half-hour longer than previous movies, with a PG rating for...hmm, maybe the fact that Christopher went to war, tho we don't see any of the violence. Oh, and he's implied to have lost his father in his early teens. It's hard to tell which demographic is most targeted herein.

Is CR to Milne's creation what Hook is to J.M. Barrie's? There are similarities, but I wouldn't go that far. I perceive CR to offer a more familiar take on established characters. If nothing else, there is a good measure of poignancy I've come to recognize as a Disney signature. And yes, it's cute. That was enough to justify my ticket.