- Darkstar Pictures Announces Free Online Film Festival!
- Stunning First Look at Indie Fantasy THE WANTING MARE [Trailer]
- Stunning First Look at Indie Fantasy THE WANTING MARE [Trailer]
- Stunning First Look at Indie Fantasy THE WANTING MARE [Trailer]
- SKYLINES Is Coming! [Poster Premiere]
- Who Hunts Who in HUNTER HUNTER? [Trailer]
- MONSTER HUNTER Coming for Christmas [Trailer]
- Saskatoon Fantastic Film Festival Returns with In-Person Event [Line Up]
- LUNATIQUE Director Returns with WASTELAND 3 Promo [Short Film]
- Win a copy of JAMES CAMERON'S STORY OF SCIENCE FICTION [Contest]
- Slice of Life, Blade Runner inspired short
- Is Snowpeircer a sequel to Willy Wonka?
- Re: Yesterday
- Re: Yesterday
- Yesterday
- Re: White Night (or where do I get my 30 + from now?)
- Re: White Night (or where do I get my 30 + from now?)
- Re: White Night (or where do I get my 30 + from now?)
- Re: White Night (or where do I get my 30 + from now?)
- Re: White Night (or where do I get my 30 + from now?)
- LUNATIQUE Director Returns with WASTELAND 3 Promo [Short Film]
- A Comet Destoys Earth in GREENLAND Trailer
- Interactive WAR OF THE WORLDS Adaptation Out Now!
- 8K Trailer for Train to Busan Sequel PENINSULA Drops Hard!
- Making a Bomb Shelter in a Funhouse is a Bad Idea in IMPACT EVENT [Trailer]
- Retro Slave: FOX's Post-Apocalyptic Sitcom WOOPS!
- TRAIN TO BUSAN Sequel PENINSULA Gets a Teaser Trailer
- New on Blu-ray and DVD for March 11, 2020
- The Apocalypse Kills Women in ONLY [Trailer]
- Trailer for TheWalking Dead: World Beyond Spin-Off Series
- BORDERLANDS Movie From Eli Roth in Development
- A Woman's Mind Unravels in BIGHT HILL ROAD [Review]
- TIFF 2020: Vanlife Gets a Reality Check in NOMADLAND [Review]
- TIFF 2020: APPLES, THE WAY I SEE IT, PIECES OF A WOMAN & ONE NIGHT IN MIAMI [Capsule Reviews]
- TIFF 2020: The Truth Tellers Return with THE NEW CORPORATION: THE UNFORTUNATELY NECESSARY SEQUEL [Review]
- TIFF 2020: NEW ORDER is Brutal, Violent & a Must-See [Review]
- TIFF 2020: ENEMIES OF THE STATE, Or Are They? [Review]
- TIFF 2020: HOLLER Explores Life in a Dying Town [Review]
- Fantasia 2020: THE OAK ROOM, MARYGOROUND & CLIMATE OF THE HUNTER [Capsule Reviews]
- UNCLE PECKERHEAD is One Note but Fun [Review]
- Dave Franco Shows Potential as Director with Debut Feature THE RENTAL [Review]
- VIFF2020: Director Loretta Todd on the Making of Her Debut Feature MONKEY BEACH [Interview]
- TIFF 2020: APPLES, THE WAY I SEE IT, PIECES OF A WOMAN & ONE NIGHT IN MIAMI [Capsule Reviews]
- TIFF 2020: The Truth Tellers Return with THE NEW CORPORATION: THE UNFORTUNATELY NECESSARY SEQUEL [Review]
- TIFF 2020: NEW ORDER is Brutal, Violent & a Must-See [Review]
- TIFF 2020: ENEMIES OF THE STATE, Or Are They? [Review]
- NO ESCAPE Director Talks Influencers, Escape Rooms & Writing [Interview]
- TIFF 2020: HOLLER Explores Life in a Dying Town [Review]
- The Funny Side of Alien Invasions: You have to SAVE YOURSELVES! [Trailer]
- Kodi Smit-McPhee Goes to the Future to Save the Present in 2067 [Trailer]
- First Look at Denis Villeneuve's DUNE [Trailer]
- Fantasia 2020: LAPSIS, THE COLUMNIST, MINOR PREMISE, FEELS GOOD MAN & HAIL TO THE DEADITES [Capsule Reviews]
- BUNRAKU Writer/Director Returns with LX 2048 [Trailer]
- BLOOD QUANTUM Writer/Director Talks Inspiration, Zombies & Representation [Interview]
- Fantasia 2020: THE OAK ROOM, MARYGOROUND & CLIMATE OF THE HUNTER [Capsule Reviews]
- Sylvester McCoy Talks SENSE8, DOCTOR WHO & THE OWNERS [Interview]
- Fantasia 2020: PVT CHAT, PATRICK, TIME OF MOULTING, SLEEP [Capsule Reviews]
- Scholar Mitch Horowitz Breaks Down Faith, Horror & CURSED FILMS [Interview]
- Actor Cosmo Jarvis Talks About his New Thriller THE SHADOW OF VIOLENCE [Interview]
- Director Jay Cheel Talks Making of Horror Documentary CURSED FILMS [Interview]
- Europe is in Shambles in UNDERGODS [Trailer]
Jack In
Latest Comments
Latest Forum Posts
PA News
Latest Reviews
Older News
Crew
Marina Antunes
Editor in Chief
Vancouver, British Columbia
Christopher Webster
Managing Editor
Edmonton, Alberta
DN aka quietearth
Founder / Asst. Managing Editor
Denver, Colorado
Simon Read
UK Correspondent
Edinburgh, Scotland
Rick McGrath
Toronto Correspondent
Toronto, Ontario
Manuel de Layet
France Correspondent
Paris, France
rochefort
Austin Correspondent
Austin, Texas
Daniel Olmos
Corrispondente in Italia
Italy
Griffith Maloney aka Griffith Maloney
New York Correspondent
New York, NY
Stephanie O
Floating Correspondent
Quiet Earth Bunker
Jason Widgington
Montreal Correspondent
Montreal, Quebec
Carlos Prime
Austin Correspondent
Austin, TX
Latest news







A remote, gorgeous mansion that offers safe haven to children with special powers. A kindly guardian who protects these children, not only from the outside world but from hostile adults with nefarious intentions and their own blend of special powers. A young man who seeks out this collection of beautiful freaks in the hopes of learning more about his own past. Sound familiar? "Tim Burton's X Men" aka Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children puts the ole Burtonesque spin on a different superhero formula (the first being Batman, of course), and if it sounds like I'm being snarky with that comparison, I'm not.
Burton's filmography has its share of lows, highs, and incredibly highs, and whenever he puts out a new movie, I imagine some of the fans who grew up with his early work just don't get as excited as they used to. I've made my peace with his body of work, less concerned with whether or not he'll ever make another Edward Scissorhands or Ed Wood and more with the fact that, other than a few copycats, he's still a one-man genre. His latest is an adaptation of the novel by Ransom Riggs, a story of gifted youngsters ("peculiars") who exist outside of our own world by seeking refuge in time loops, 24-hour endlessly repeating cycles of a given day that allow them a certain amount of anonymity and relative safety.
When Jake (Asa Butterfield) goes in search of one of these after the death of his estranged grandfather (Terence Stamp), his quest leads to a Welsh orphanage that was demolished during WWII by Nazi bombers. He happens upon the aforementioned loop and is taken back in time to the day of the bombing, where he finds the orphanage not only fully intact but full of a number of odd children with special abilities, including matter-manipulator Enoch (Finlay MacMillan), lighter-than-air Emma (Ella Purnell), and the overseer of the group, Miss Peregrine (Eva Green). Peregrine is an Ymbryne, one of a group of benevolent beings who have been charged with watching over the world's peculiars in self-imposed exile around the world, and she's the one who resets the time loop every night. Jake's arrival is both a blessing and a curse, as he may have exposed Miss Peregrine's brood to the hollowgasts, evil, power-obsessed adult peculiars led by Barron (Samuel L. Jackson, who's having some major fun here), and who hope to gain immortality by eating the eyes of as many peculiar children as they can catch.
Author Riggs' source material and Burton's filmmaking style are about as perfect a marriage as one could hope for (although I still hold out hope that one day Burton will do Lovecraft or an Edgar Allen Poe biography). The result is a movie that follows quite a few familiar beats, but in this case feels less like a rehashing and more like old-fashioned Burton storytelling, which is what most of us want from him anyway.
All the warm-blanket tropes are here, from the crooked architecture and lush period costumes and decor down to Burton's continued fascination and sympathy for the outsider. Our cultural perspective on weird has changed a bit since we were first introduced to Pee Wee and Beetlejuice, and whether it's intentional or not, the story this time around doesn't focus much on the shaky relationship between the peculiars and the "normal world".
Once it's established that peculiars just don't fit in and have therefore retreated to their respective hiding places, the real plot is about the ages-old conflict between different generations of the gifted. It's a very smart deviation, not only from Burton's typical work but from what we've come to expect from most outsider stories, and it allows us to spend almost half the runtime just enjoying the tour. And CGI or not, the villains here, the hollowgasts, are genuinely effective, like creepy, stilt-legged offspring of Jack Skellington and Spider-Man's Venom, and there's a real sense of genuine menace whenever they're on screen.
If you've given up on Burton, and just can't abide sitting through another one of his goth-drenched fantasies, then this movie will certainly not change your mind. The man knows what he likes and you could debate all day as to whether or not he's taking any risks at this point in his career. For every Beetlejuice there's an Alice in Wonderland, for every Sweeney Todd there's a Dark Shadows. The fact that his next scheduled movie is a Beetlejuice sequel doesn't exactly fill me with joy, but it doesn't provoke dread, either. Burton is a director who has had ups and downs, but he's never stayed down, and I personally believe that when his source material is good, he's great. Miss Peregrine is definitely good, definitely surpassed my expectations, and is easily recommendable.
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children opens September 30.
Recommended Release: The Tim Burton Collection + Hardcover Book
You might also like





