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Review #420 of 365
Movie Review of The Last Mimzy (2007) [PG] 94 minutes
WIP™ Scale: $11.50
Where Viewed: United Artists Denver Pavilions Stadium 15, Denver, CO
When 1st Seen: 10 March 2007
Time: 6:30 p.m.
Film's Official Website • Film's Trailer
DVD Release Date: unscheduled
Directed by: Robert Shaye (Book of Love)
Screenplay by: Bruce Joel Rubin (Stuart Little 2) and Toby Emmerich (Frequency), Screen story by James V. Hart and Carol Skilken based the short story "Mimsy Were the Borogoves" by Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore
Featured Cast (Where You Might Remember Him/Her From):
Rhiannon Leigh Wryn (Hulk) • Chris O'Neil (debut) • Rainn Wilson (My Super Ex-Girlfriend) • Joely Richardson ("Nip/Tuck") • Timothy Hutton (The Good Shepherd) • Kathryn Hahn (The Holiday) • Michael Clarke Duncan (School for Scoundrels)
Soundtrack: Download the Roger Waters singled "Hello (I Love You)" from the film now from ![Roger Waters - Hello (I Love You) [From "The Last Mimzy"] - Single](http://ax.phobos.apple.com.edgesuite.net/images/badgeitunes61x15dark.gif){kind=small}
— or — order the CD Soundtrack below
Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word or less review of this film]
Certain to get a lot of critical grief, The Last Mimzy resounds the cry once again, via a science fiction tale of children saving the world, for we humans to set things right just now and save our future. Reminiscent, to a degree, of one of my beloved childhood films, Escape to Witch Mountain—please don't hold it against me—the story begins innocently enough with a brother and sister discovering a unique package off the shore of their Whidbey Island cottage. The strange geometric icon opens and reveals a strange glass object capable of resonating and changing unique ways. Noah (Chris O'Neill) plays with it and tries to keep it from his sister, Emma (Rhiannon Leigh Wryn). She, however, investigates the box further while he sleeps and finds more interesting objects inside including some sliced geodes, a shell filled with goo, a blue sea cucumber, and a hidden door reveals the prize, a stuffed bunny who explains, in a garbled tone only Emma can comprehend, it is the last Mimzy. The children play with the 'toys' and soon develop special powers. Emma can spin the geode pieces in the air and create a strange chamber which, when she puts something inside, seems to atomize including her own hands. Noah can communicate with insects and has begun to draw ancient Buddhist Mandalas from memory. This sparks the interest of his science teacher, Mr. White (Rainn Wilson) who has recently been to Nepal and whose girlfriend, Naomi (Kathryn Hahn) believes the dreams he has been having since are the key to their good future. When Noah builds an incredible science fair project involving spiders spinning an incredible tubular web according to geometric patterns based on sound frequencies he generates with his computer, and when Emma scares away a babysitter with her 'magic' trick of atomizing her hands, their parents Jo (Joely Richardson) and David Wilder (Timothy Hutton) must finally accept that something odd is going on with their children and seek help.
"…despite the cliché's, the film is still worth a look…"
Of course, lacking a proper villain, the story has to involve Homeland Security agent for the Pacific Northwest division, Nathanial Broadman (Michael Clarke Duncan) who uncovers the powers of the children by accident when Noah uses the glass crystal and the blue sea cucumber to create a mysterious power generator that blacks out half the region. Things like this (the government as villain) and the typically odd response by the parents of gifted children toward their children, plummet the story into charted waters and nearly cliché territory. It's too bad Hollywood took so long to make this film, as the messages were more timely back when originally written by the writing team of Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore under the pen name of Lewis Padgett in the 1940s and 1950s. The origin of the story comes about from a line in the Lewis Carroll poem, "The Jabberwocky" as found in Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There "All mimsy were the borogoves", which became the title of their short story. The concept is that what if Alice in Wonderland, was real? What if Lewis Carroll got the idea from true events, and Alice really did go through the looking glass, only the looking glass wasn't a looking glass at all, it was a time portal from the future. Well, let's not give away much more of the plot of this story, suffice it to say that it will be up to Noah and Emma to use the powers given to them by the toys to save the future of humanity once and for all.
As far as the film itself goes, all of the creative genius behind the story aside, unfortunately as much as the sci-fi fiction fan as I was as a kid, and I would have loved this story and film, by now it fits a pattern seen too many times from "The 4400" to Steven Spielberg's "Taken", yes, Disney's Escape to Witch Mountain. There is a great message for kids today about working to ensure the health of humanity stays intact, which is good, it's just unfortunate the cliché villainous government agencies once again do all they can to show not only their complete ineptitude, but their nearly voracious attempts to prevent the children from doing what needs to be done to save the future just as they nearly killed E.T. The scenes, in fact, where the government agents storm the Wilder home and forcibly take the entire family into custody without a search warrant may, in fact, be too intense for younger children to watch. While the special effects are quite good, here is another example of a major motion picture that probably would have made a better Sci-Fi Channel mini-series. Such a longer venue would have given the writers more time to develop the characters, help the audience to fully comprehend the problems in the future, tie back to better to the Alice in Wonderland mythology, get at why the crystal had the Mandala-drawing effect on Noah's mind, decrease the reliance on cliché villains and stereotypically drawn parental characters. The two child actors, Rhiannon Leigh Wryn and Chris O'Neil were outstanding and far better than their adult counterparts. A mini-series also would have afforded more time for them to develop their craft and their characters. The film is still worth a look keeping these things in mind.
As far as the film itself goes, all of the creative genius behind the story aside, unfortunately as much as the sci-fi fiction fan as I was as a kid, and I would have loved this story and film, by now it fits a pattern seen too many times from "The 4400" to Steven Spielberg's "Taken", yes, Disney's Escape to Witch Mountain. There is a great message for kids today about working to ensure the health of humanity stays intact, which is good, it's just unfortunate the cliché villainous government agencies once again do all they can to show not only their complete ineptitude, but their nearly voracious attempts to prevent the children from doing what needs to be done to save the future just as they nearly killed E.T. The scenes, in fact, where the government agents storm the Wilder home and forcibly take the entire family into custody without a search warrant may, in fact, be too intense for younger children to watch. While the special effects are quite good, here is another example of a major motion picture that probably would have made a better Sci-Fi Channel mini-series. Such a longer venue would have given the writers more time to develop the characters, help the audience to fully comprehend the problems in the future, tie back to better to the Alice in Wonderland mythology, get at why the crystal had the Mandala-drawing effect on Noah's mind, decrease the reliance on cliché villains and stereotypically drawn parental characters. The two child actors, Rhiannon Leigh Wryn and Chris O'Neil were outstanding and far better than their adult counterparts. A mini-series also would have afforded more time for them to develop their craft and their characters. The film is still worth a look keeping these things in mind.
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Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word review of this film]
Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word review of this film]
Other Projects Featuring The Last Mimzy (2007)
Cast Members
Rhiannon Leigh Wryn
• Chris O'Neil • Rainn WilsonJoely Richardson
• Timothy Hutton • Kathryn HahnKirsten Williamson
• Michael Clarke DuncanDirector
Robert Shaye
Co-Screenplay Writers
Bruce Joel Rubin
• Toby Emmerich| CD Soundtrack | Book | DVD |
| VHS |
The Last Mimzy (2007) Review-lite [150-word cap]
The Last Mimzy resounds the cry once again, via a science fiction tale of children saving the world, for we humans to set things right just now and save our future. The story begins innocently enough with a brother, Noah (Chris O'Neill), and sister, Emma (Rhiannon Leigh Wryn), discovering a unique package containing strange objects inside. Over time, the objects give them special powers and insights into the world and the future. Of course, their parents are bewildered, as is the nefarious government agency charged with discovering the source of the threat to national security that arises when Noah inadvertently darkens the entire Pacific Northwest when he combines two of the objects into some strange sort of power generator. While still worth a look, unfortunately, the film folds in on itself with cliché villains, stereotypically ill-equipped parents, and a babysitter that believes the entire family is not of this world.
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