Schoolgirl Meg (Storm Reid) has the type of close relationship with her physicist father (Chris Pine) that can only be filmed in weird angles with unnecessary close-ups and lots of gibberish dialog. He claims to be able to teleport around the universe and vanishes after adopting the off-putting Charles Wallace (Deric McCabe). For the next four years Meg is angry and filled with self doubt in an indie drama kind of way. Enter three massively underwritten goddesses, Mrs. Which, Mrs. Whatsit, and Mrs. Who (Oprah Winfrey, Reese Witherspoon, and Mindy Kaling). They’ve been chatting with Charles Wallace in some vague and unlikely way and are ready to take him, Meg, and a random kid named Calvin (Levi Miller) universe jumping to find Meg’s dad. This leads to a meandering trip where the goddesses are of little help and the kids are aimless.
An ugly After School Special with all the charm ripped away, A Wrinkle in Time is dull, simplistic, and a failure that earned its box office bomb status. It is meant as a children’s movie, but it is insulting to children and the characters speak not like kids but as corporate execs vaguely think children might speak, keeping in mind these execs have never met one.
Some films fail in little ways. Some in large ways. A Wrinkle in Time fails in every way. No one involved seemed up to the challenge, which really means director Ava DuVernay wasn’t up for the challenge. She was a successful low-budget character drama and documentary director, but a 100 million dollar tent-pole special effects fantasy is a different matter. Artistry isn’t enough. You need skill and experience and the ability to lead a city. She has yet to develop these.
The most visible sign of incompetence is the inconsistency. Sometimes the film is shot well; sometimes it is blurred and under-lit. Sometimes it is expansive, sometimes it is claustrophobic (and I don’t mean when it is trying to be). The acting wobbles from controlled and real to high school theater production. And then there’s the special effects. They are never top drawer for 2018, but sometimes they are passable, and sometimes they are amateurish. Half the film seems to have been created on a very small sound stage surrounded by green screens. Sure, there are great flowing vistas, but our characters never interact with them. We are supposed to be wowed by the visuals, but there’s no magic here.
Pacing and structure makes it all worse. Things plod along, and then leap forward. Ideas are repeated until driven into the ground (gosh, is she angry because her father left and she doesn’t accept herself? Please explain that ten more times in a row). Sometimes they hang on a world for a time, others they just pop in, look around at the green screens, and pop out.
This is a strangely sterile film. It should wrap the viewer with wonder and emotion, but that never happens. It should take the viewer along on an adventure, but there’s no excitement. The prevailing wisdom is that the surrealistic children’s novel was unfilmable. I can’t say if that’s the case, but this shouldn’t have been filmed.