Peter Pan

Peter Pan
Directed by	P. J. Hogan
Produced by	Patrick McCormick
Written by	Screenplay: P. J. Hogan Michael Goldenberg Novel and play: J. M. Barrie
Starring	Jeremy Sumpter Ludivine Sagnier Rachel Hurd-Wood Jason Isaacs
Music by	James Newton Howard
Cinematography	Donald McAlpine
Editing by	Garth Craven Michael Kahn
Distributed by	Universal Pictures (USA, Canada, UK, France, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand) Columbia Pictures (all other areas)
Release date(s)	December 25, 2003
Running time	113 minutes
Country	Australia United Kingdom
Language	English
Budget	US$100,000,000[1]
Gross revenue	$121,975,011[1]

Peter Pan is a 2003 film released as a joint venture of Universal Studios, Columbia Pictures and Revolution Studios. P. J. Hogan directed a screenplay co-written with Michael Goldenberg which is based on the classic play and novel by J. M. Barrie. Jason Isaacs plays the roles of Captain Hook and George Darling, Olivia Williams plays Mrs. Darling, while Jeremy Sumpter plays Peter Pan, Rachel Hurd-Wood portrays Wendy Darling, and Ludivine Sagnier plays Tinker Bell. Noted actress Lynn Redgrave plays a supporting role as Aunt Millicent, a new character created for the film. Contrary to the traditional stage casting, it featured a boy in the title role.

Plot

This story is a fairly faithful adaptation of the play and novel by J. M. Barrie. In it, the perpetually young Peter Pan (Jeremy Sumpter) from time to time visits his birthplace of London in 1904, where he becomes enthralled by the stories he hears being told by Wendy Darling (Rachel Hurd-Wood) to her brothers. Wendy asks to visit Never Land and Peter invites her to be the "mother" to his gang of Lost Boys. Before leaving, she asks to bring her brothers John (Harry Newell) and Michael (Freddie Popplewell), and Peter teaches them all to fly with him.

Out of jealousy, Tinker Bell (Ludivine Sagnier) tricks the Lost Boys into shooting Wendy as she approaches the island, but Wendy survives and the boys ask her to be their mother and tell them stories. Meanwhile Captain Hook (Jason Isaacs) captures John and Michael and holds them as bait for Peter. Wendy and Peter free them, with help from the Amerindian princess Tiger Lily (Haida speaker, Carsen Gray) and the timely arrival of the crocodile that ate Hook's hand.

That night, Peter and Wendy share a romantic "fairy dance", while Hook spies on them, distressed that Peter has "found himself a Wendy". Peter reminds Wendy that "they" are make believe, and Wendy confronts Peter about his feelings about love. Peter becomes upset with her, and tells her to go home if she's not happy. Wendy, in tears, escapes to her little house. Peter returns to the Darling house, and seeing that Wendy's mother is still waiting for the children to come home, he attempts to shut the window (to make Wendy's parents forget about them). But, after a struggle, Wendy's parents manage to reopen the window, refusing to let it be closed.

Hook later finds Wendy and has her carried to his ship, the Jolly Roger. There, he entices her with a job telling stories to the crew, then sends a spy to follow her to the Lost Boys' underground lair. The next day, after Peter hears of a new pirate, Wendy admits she was asked to serve as a crewman. Later, the pirates kidnap her and the boys by tying every one of them up and gagging them and carrying them over their shoulders to Hook's ship, but since Hook is unable to reach Peter, he leaves poison for Peter to drink when he wakes up. Tink stops him, poisoning herself in the process; Peter reaches out to the other children sleeping around the world, the Darlings, and even the pirates to sustain her with their belief in fairies.

Peter and Tink save the children from walking the plank, and they all fight against the pirates. Hook gets sprinkled with Tink's fairy dust, and duels Peter in the air, weakening him with taunts about Wendy abandoning him and growing up. Peter finally falls, unable to fight anymore and gives in to inevitable death. But with a "thimble"(kiss) from Wendy, Peter recovers and sends Hook above the crocodile. The crocodile takes a jump out of the water and snaps his jaws around Hook. Hook begins to think unhappy thoughts, which drag him down and allow the crocodile to swallow him alive. Wendy decides that she belongs back home, and returns to London with her brothers and the Lost Boys. Peter chooses not to grow up.

In an alternate ending based on Barrie's epilogue, included on the DVD release with unfinished special effects, Peter returns to the London house 20 years later, finding Wendy as a grown mother. He is deeply hurt when she tells him she has grown up, and walks over to Wendy's daughter who is asleep in bed. His sobbing awakwes the little girl, and she introduces herself as Jane. Peter excitedly grins at Wendy, and with permission, Jane flies away with Peter to Neverland.

Cast

• Jeremy Sumpter as Peter Pan
• Rachel Hurd-Wood as Wendy Darling
• Jason Isaacs as Captain Hook/Mister Darling
• Lynn Redgrave as Aunt Millicent
• Richard Briers as Smee
• Olivia Williams as Mrs. Darling
• Geoffrey Palmer as Sir Edward Quiller Couch
• Harry Newell as John Darling
• Freddie Popplewell as Michael Darling
• Ludivine Sagnier as Tink
• Theodore Chester as Slightly
• Rupert Simonian as Tootles
• George MacKay as Curly
• Harry Eden as Nibs
• Patrick Gooch as Twin
• Lachlan Gooch as Twin
• Carsen Gray as Tiger Lily
• Maggie Dence as Lady Quiller Couch
• Kerry Walker as Miss Fulsom
• Mathew Waters as Messenger Boy
• Alan Cinis as Skylights
• Frank Whitten as Starkey
• Bruce Spence as Cookson
• Daniel Wyllie as Alf Mason
• Brian Carbee as Albino
• Don Battee as Giant Pirate (as Don Batte)
• Frank Gallacher as Alsation Fogarty
• Septimus Caton as Noodler
• Jacob Tomuri as Bill Jukes
• Venant Wong as Quang Lee
• Phil Meacham as Bollard
• Darren Mitchell as Mullins
• Michael Roughan as Cecco
• Bill Kerr as Fairy Guide

Production

After the script was written, Stephen Cox, Chief Press Officer for Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Trust and the Institute for Child Health, gave the hospital's approval, saying, "We have read the script by P. J. Hogan and Michael Goldenberg and are delighted to report that we feel that it is in keeping with the original work whilst communicating to an audience with modern sensibilities."^[2]

The visual effects in the film are a mixture of practical and digital. The fairies that appear in the film are actors composited into the film with some digital enhancements. According to actor Jason Isaacs, the filmmakers were impressed with actress Ludivine Sagnier's performance and decided to abandon their plans to make Tinker Bell entirely computer animated.^[3] The film also features a large, computer-generated crocodile. Another character, an animatronic parrot, appears in some scenes on the pirate ship.

A complex harness was built to send the live-action actors rotating and gliding through the air for the flight sequences. They were then composited into the shots of London and Never Land, although they are sometimes replaced with computer-generated figures. Other aspects of bringing the fantastic story to life include the complex sword-fighting sequences, for which the actors were trained. Sumpter said that, "I had to train for five months before the shoot. I had to do harness training to learn how to fly and learn how to swordfight," and that, "I got stabbed a couple of times with a sword."^[4] Hogan says that the flying scenes very difficult to accomplish, but that, "it was tougher on the kids than it was for me. They were up there on the harness 12' off the ground, having to make it look like flying is easy and fun."^[5]

Sumpter grew several inches over the course of the film's production, requiring staging tricks to retain Hook's height advantage over Peter in face-to-face scenes late in the process. Hollywood-based producer Lucy Fisher also said that, ""The window he flies out of had to be enlarged twice."^[3]

The film is dedicated to Dodi Al-Fayed, who was executive producer of the 1991 film Hook. Al-Fayed planned to produce a live action version of Peter Pan, and shared his ideas with Princess Diana (who was President of Great Ormond St Hospital), who said she "could not wait to see the production once it was underway." Al-Fayed's father, Mohammed Al-Fayed, co-produced the 2003 adaptation of the classic fairy tale after his son died in the car crash which also killed Princess Diana.^[6]

Finding Neverland, a film about J. M. Barrie and the creation of Peter Pan, was originally scheduled to be released in 2003, but the producers of this film – who held the screen rights to the story – refused permission for that film to use scenes from the play unless its release was delayed until the following year.

Filming, which lasted about twelve months and ended in June 2003, took place entirely inside sound stages on Australia's Gold Coast and New Zealand.^[7] According to Fisher, the decision to shoot in Australia was based on the low value of the Australian dollar at that time.^[7] Hogan had originally planned on filming in a variety of locations such as Tahiti, New Zealand, and London but abandoned this idea after scouting some of the locations.^[8] Filming on sound stages did, however, help "retain some of the theatricality of the original play", something which Hogan thought was important.^[9]

Merchandise

For the promotion of the film, the original novel of Peter Pan by J.M Barrie was released with the cover that was the same look as the teaser poster. A video game was also released only for the Game Boy Advance on December 10, 2003. In it players can fly, fight, and solve various puzzles and collect special objects for special prizes and bonus points. The game received mixed reviews overall with Gamezone giving it a 6.4/10, Cubed3 giving it a 5.2/10, and Nintendo Power giving it a 2.2/5. Cubed3 criticized the game for the bad dialogue and repetitive and rushed gameplay, but praising the graphics and sound.

Reception

The film was generally well received by critics. Based on 129 reviews collected by the film review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, 76% of critics gave Peter Pan a positive review.^[10] Film critic Roger Ebert gave the film three and a half out of four stars.^[11]

The film earned $48.4 million at the box office in the United States and another $73.5 million outside of the US.^[1] It faced competition from the highly-anticipated The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King released the week before, and Cheaper by the Dozen which opened on the same day.

Jeremy Sumpter won a Saturn Award for Best Performance by a younger actor,^[12] for which Rachel Hurd-Wood was also nominated. The film was nominated for a Saturn Award for Best Fantasy Film. Sumpter also won a 2004 Young Artist Award; Harry Newell, Rachel Hurd-Wood, and Carson Gray were all nominated.^[13]

References

External links

• Peter Pan at the Internet Movie Database

v • d • e Peter Pan Characters Peter Pan · Wendy Darling · Captain Hook · Tinker Bell · The Lost Boys · Other characters Official books and plays The Little White Bird · Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens · Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up · Peter and Wendy · Peter Pan in Scarlet Films Peter Pan (1924) · Peter Pan (1953) · Hook (1991) · Return to Never Land (2002) · Peter Pan (2003) · Finding Neverland (2004) · Tinker Bell (2008) · Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure (2009) TV series The Lost Boys (1978) · Peter Pan no Bōken (1989) · Peter Pan and the Pirates (1990-1991) Video games Peter Pan and the Pirates · Hook Related people J. M. Barrie · Llewelyn Davies boys · Sylvia Llewelyn Davies · Arthur Llewelyn Davies · Charles Frohman