The Magical World Of Disney #350: Top 100 Disney Movies, Part 20

62. The BFG (2016)

Ten-year-old Sophie is in for the adventure of a lifetime when she meets the Big Friendly Giant. Naturally scared at first, the young girl soon realizes that the 24-foot behemoth is actually quite gentle and charming. As their friendship grows, Sophie’s presence attracts the unwanted attention of Bloodbottler, Fleshlumpeater and other giants. After traveling to London, Sophie and the BFG must convince Queen Victoria to help them get rid of all the bad giants once and for all.

Well, let’s take a look at what we have here, an adaptation of one of Roald Dahl’s most beloved children’s’ stories, it’s directed by Steven Spielberg, who is usually excellent when it comes to family adventures like this, it’s written by the late Melissa Mathison, who wrote classics like The Black Stallion and E.T., it’s a Disney movie, whose had quite an amazing track record this year, and it’s Mark Rylance, the terrific actor from Bridge Of Spies who won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor last year, as the Big Friendly Giant, how can this possibly fail?

Well, it doesn’t, it’s everything you could’ve possibly imagined the film would be. I really enjoyed the hell out of this movie, it is such an excellent adaptation of this beloved children’s book that seems more light-hearted than the actual much darker story, which, you know what, I’m fine with it being more lighthearted and more family friendly as long as the movie itself works and the film does for the most part.

I’ll start with the negative things I have for this one because there really is not a whole lot of negativity I have towards the film. Most of it really comes into the third act, the third act of the movie where Sophie and BFG go see the queen and she’s totally fine with the fact that this giant is telling her about these other bad giants in town, it’s a little hard to believe. I know that they made her dream look exactly like this moment in real life but still, it’s a little much. I just don’t think the queen or hell, any of the characters in Buckingham Palace weren’t really that well developed, once again, this is another movie where Rebecca Hall, who plays the queen’s maid, is very underused. Rebecca Hall is a really good actress but I don’t think these blockbusters really know how to use here well, much like she was in Iron Man 3 or Transcendence.

Also, there’s not really an indication of what timeperiod this takes place, it’s not until you have to listen in on some of the things they say like bringing up The Reagans and there’s even a scene with an E.T. doll in there to know that you’re in the 1980s, more than likely 1982 since that’s when the book came out and it would make sense why the E.T. doll is here.

Probably my biggest fault with the film is the final battle with the evil giants, in that it’s incredibly short and quick. I mean, you usually go all out for the last big fight of the film. Hell, the scene earlier with the cars could’ve been the climax of the movie but the actual ending is really short, like under a minute.

But those are my only real complaints about the film, mostly in the third act, it doesn’t pull a Damon Lindelof and just ruin the film but it’s more like a nuisance type of thing.

Now let’s get to the good stuff, there’s a lot to talk about.

First off, the movie looks absolutely fantastic, the movie’s attention to detail and create this world established by Dahl’s book is pitch perfect, it feels just like you’re watching the book being told in real life. Every world here is everything you could’ve imagined it looking like. The visuals in this are also fantastic, the tree sequence alone is one of the most magical things I’ve seen on the big screen in awhile, the motion capture work is also top notch too, this is some of the best motion capture work I’ve seen, when you see The BFG in full form, he looks incredible, you could actually believe this giant is standing there in real life.

The greatest aspect of this movie is the two leads, Mark Rylance and Ruby Barnhill. Mark Rylance as The BFG is absolutely fantastic, he perfectly captures the spirit of the characters and gives yet another amazing performance that’s worthy of an Oscar nomination. And Ruby Barnhill, just another reason why this has been the best summer in a long time for up and coming kid actors, first Tom Holland in Captain America: Civil War, then Angourie Rice in The Nice Guys, and now, Ruby Barnhill in The BFG. She was excellent in this and her performance is very genuine and authentic, there’s not a moment in this movie where it feels fake or she’s clearly looking off at something else, no, she has a really genuine authentic performance in this and her connection with Rylance’s BFG is pitch perfect, it’s very similar to the relationship of Elliott & E.T. and I even saw a little bit of Christina Ricci’s Kat and Casper from the Spielberg produced Casper movie in there as well.

The music is once again fantastic, it’s another terrific John Williams score with Williams at his absolute best.

They even manage to make funny fart jokes in this, I know, it’s hard to believe but it’s absolutely true, the way they do the grossout humor in this movie, as it was also in the book as well, is absolutely perfect, this is how you make grossout humor come off as funny in a movie.

I also really appreciated how the whole movie comes off as something that would’ve come out in the 80s, even the opening credits seem very reminiscent of the opening credits to The Goonies in a way. The movie also take a lot of inspiration from Spileberg’s own Hook in terms of how the movie is shot and how it opens. There’s even a little bit of Twice Upon A Time thrown in here with how the dreams and nightmares are put together and presented.

I was really afraid going into this that this was going to be another Where The Wild Things Are, where the kid was going to be this insane asshole in the beginning and it expects you to root for him even after the opening of the film is him literally doing animal abuse on his poor dog, you expect me to cheer for this kid after something like this? No, get the fuck out of here. Plus, I was afraid that the movie was going to go nowhere, be devoit of any creative or brilliance just like Where The Wild Things Are was. Yeah, the monsters actually looked cool and they were acted really well but I still need to be thrilled by something.

The BFG is about as close to perfect as you can get, if the third act had been handled a lot better, this would been probably the best movie of the year but as it stands, I still think it’s one of the year’s standout films, well-acted, well-written, well-shot, well-animated, it’s Steven Spielberg continuing to prove why he’s a force that’s not to be messed with and he shows that he’s still got it. For families out there, they will definitely love The BFG.

61. Muppets Most Wanted (2014)

While on a grand world tour, The Muppets find themselves wrapped into an European jewel-heist caper headed by a Kermit the Frog look-alike and his dastardly sidekick (Ricky Gervais). Ty Burrell stars as an Interpol operative who teams up with Sam The Eagle to crack the case and Tina Fey plays a Siberian prison guard who is the leader of the prison Kermit is thrown into.

The last Muppets movie was a great return to form for the crew after they stumble hard with Muppets From Space and this movie is the absolute perfection of what a great follow up to The Muppets should be. It’s a sequel that’s just as great as the original film is and honestly, that’s all I can ask for.

I’m not even kidding, I really fell in love with this movie. This is exactly what a good Muppet style adventure should be like, no BS, no pop culture references thrown in for the sake of appealing to today’s audience, just a good old fashioned funny and hilarious romp.

Right off the bat, the movie won me over because it disregarded that terrible tacked on ending to Chris Cooper’s plan from the first movie and went right into the sequel with a pretty great musical number.

In fact, all the songs in this movie were pretty damn good. Once again, my props to Bret Mackenzie for writing some pretty great original music like he did with the first movie.

In addition, the script does a great job of keeping what we love about these characters and not resorting them to just lazy imitations to try to appeal to the kids of today like with how other franchises have resorted to that low.

Also, the writing in this film is so cleverly handled, Nicholas Stoller and James Bobin know what they are doing, they know they are making a sequel, they know there’s a chance this won’t live up to the predecessor, and they are going to let the audience know that they are very much in on the joke from the story we’ve seen done to death so many times to the clichés we’re used to seeing in so many other movies that the film uses here.

They even use elements used in previous Muppet films like the big one being a wedding for Kermit and Miss Piggy like in The Muppets Take Manhattan but at the same time, not overall ripping off that scene from Muppets Take Manhattan. Basically, they did the complete opposite of what Star Trek Into Darkness did where they basically remade Wrath Of Khan in its’ third act…I’m sorry, they did and that’s why I didn’t like Star Trek Into Darkness all that much for how lazy that third act was written. This movie doesn’t do that.

The sequel works because it does everything a good sequel should do, be just as entertaining as the first movie, creating some great new characters, have great music, a good story to work with, and also have a lot of great funny jokes.

The main cast works great here. Ricky Gervais is very funny as the sidekick to Constantine, Tina Fey’s great in the role of the Russian prison guard, and Ty Burrell’s hilarious as the Interpol inspector. He’s so good that I’m convinced that if they ever do a reboot of the Pink Panther franchise, they need to get him to play Inspector Clouseau.

The celebrity cameos this time around are actually really funny with people like Ray Liotta and Danny Trejo returning after making cameos in other Muppet movies, as well as Jemaine Clement, Sean Combs, Tom Hiddleston, Celine Dion, Tony Bennett, Josh Groban, Salma Hayek, Rob Corddry, Lady Gaga, and many, many more and all of them really do work very well and don’t feel forced because the writers are in on the joke.

The film does have some minor flaws but nothing big enough for me to go off on.

Muppets Most Wanted is very high up on the Muppet sequels in my opinion. It does everything a good Muppets movie should do and does what I want to see from sequels, to just be as entertaining as the original film. This movie has got everything I was hoping for with it and I highly recommend it for any Muppets fan. It’s a really great movie and should definitely be seen for any Muppet fan to appreciate.

#100 & #99

#98 & #97

#96 & #95

#94 & #93

#92 & #91

#90 & #89

#88 & #87

#86 & #85

#84 & #83

#82 & #81

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#74 & #73

#72 & #71

#70 & #69

#68 & #67

#66 & #65

#64 & #63

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