Critique: A Wrinkle in Time (Film)

*****SPOILERS*****

 

Seeing as they travelled in space (to tesser), I initially thought that ‘A Wrinkle in Space’ would be a more appropriate title. But only initially: the actual title is appropriate (and far catchier). To travel through space instantaneously, by not taking the time that the journey should have took, is sort of travelling in time. More importantly, space and time are in physics considered to be one thing (space-time) so saying ‘A Wrinkle in Time’ is essentially the same as saying ‘A Wrinkle in Space’.

 

Usually when a child acts, you can appreciate how well they did even if they’re not as capable as the adults. Yet in this film, the child actors were phenomenal, being equal to the abilities of the adults.

 

Meg is a black girl with curly hair. So when she sees the version of herself that she likes, a girl with straight hair. Meg hates her naturally curly hair and that hurts. She thinks she would be a better, more likeable person if she had straight hair. That hurts even more.

 

The three Mrs (who help Meg) are made of light. They say that tessering is done via love. The Mrs tesser a lot. So love moves light. That’s sweet.

 

When Meg first meets Mrs Who, she falls asleep after a few quotations. When awake, Mrs Who is calm and collected. So when she says, “Dang!” into her fist, it was pure perfection. But when they tessered to the final place, the three Mrs couldn’t stay long (because they were getting weak) so Mrs Who spoke in her own words. This was odd at first but finding the right quotation is taxing for her. If she’s already weak (like she is in the last location), it makes sense for her to speak with her own words.

 

The start of the film was frustrating.

Everyone was being horrid to Meg, the main character. Other kids celebrate the anniversary of Meg’s dad going missing and they wish Meg disappeared too. Um excuse me but no one of any age would say things like that.

It’s not realistic but the bullying is important for understanding Meg’s character. Toning down the bullying to something believable would be make understanding Meg better.

This was the only negative thing I have to say about this film.

 

This was a pleasant film with fantastic animation. There was a theme of female empowerment but it was gentle and ‘not in your face’, meaning even sexists couldn’t complain. Meg builds up her self-confidence and self-acceptance, qualities with which all people can struggle.