Light-hearted and charming adventures with the benevolent British bear. Paddington 2 is always crisp and clean visually, and there’s a paper mache pop-up book sequence that is quite beautiful that the characters roam through that manages not to be small but to make the paper mache larger than life. What a way to grab us. Delight us immediately with surreal visuals and toss off a few cute moments before you ever get to the pretense of a plot.
Paddington – I am tempted to refer to him as CGI Paddington and voiced by Ben Whishaw – is not one for mischief but he is clumsy. He loses his barbershop job after he shaves an old bloke down the middle of his scalp. From there he decides he’s going to be the best window cleaner in all of London, which precipitates to some wonderful visual gags. The point is, he works and works and loves his job.
Some dastardly deeds take place around London though and Paddington is mistaken for a thief of an invaluable antique book. Our beloved bear is convicted and sent to prison. A tough place for sure, but the comedy remains benign – after an accidental laundry mishap, the inmate’s black and white uniforms turn pink. The movie spends a large portion there, with Paddington responsible for retooling the chef’s grouchy demeanor and overhauling the menu to feature more marmalade for the inmates. The key to the movie is clearing Paddington’s name.
The adult actors embrace the job of hamming it up for a kid’s flick. Brendan Gleeson has the right note of surliness without pushing it too far as that bad prison chef who gets a new outlook on life because of the bear. Hugh Grant gets some laughs playing a disgraced actor who is was a neighbor of Paddington. Sally Hawkins, Julie Walters, Hugh Bonneville, Jim Broadbent among others seem to regale in the “big” campiness factor, too.
The climax on the train strains too much to give us too much bang for our buck when all we really want is some verbal bargaining. Remember, through it all, Paddington is always kind and polite, and the movie is best served when he reaches through our hearts with his logic and civilized graces. It’s a solid good movie relatively speaking to other childrens’ programmers – one that is nice – but you’re honestly not missing much if you skip it. But if you have your own kids to watch it with, it’s a winning snuggle movie for all in the household.
104 Minutes. Rated PG.
FAMILY MOVIE / AGES 4 AND UP / WEEKEND FAMILY MOVIE
Film Cousins: “Nanny McPhee” (2005); “Shaun the Sheep Movie” (2015); “Paddington” (2015); “The BFG” (2016).
