Somewhat disjointed but still with enough special moments to be passable.
This movie was a bit all over the place. Things really slow down in the 100-Acre Wood, which I didn't realize was supposed to be such a dreary place. The whole middle of the movie grinds to a bit of a halt but things pick up strongly in the final acts to make the experience worth it.
It really does best when it just lets Pooh be Pooh. He's captured really well in this live-action film, and when he's tracking honey all over the house, the movie feels like its right where its supposed to be.
The rest of the time, it's dealing with pretty heavy material of a father more focused on the grind of his work than his family. Focused more on providing for, rather than being there for. It's a pretty common trap and I didn't realize how well the movie was exploring this until this one really affecting scene where Pooh is asking Christopher if his briefcase full of important papers is more or less important than a red balloon.... trying to gain some perspective on where the briefcase's importance falls exactly. Later on that evening I'm having dinner with Emily and she asks me if a briefcase is more or less important than "your only daughter." Easy enough question to answer but obviously easy enough to forget for some.
The movie is all aces when they're in London (I still can't figure out how Tigger pronounces that exactly), and various muggles are catching glimpses of the talking stuffies including a hilarious interaction with a police officer and a taxi driver. In those moments, Christopher Robin comes closes to hitting the perfect magic of Paddington 2, but the rest of the time falls short. At least there were a few of those awesome moments.
I think one of the movie's biggest gaps that it wants you to jump over is that you have this now logical and reasonable Christopher Robin who is more focused on suitcases and saving people's jobs, but doesn't seem to blink an eye that he's grown up with all these talking animals. So when he moves from one world to the other, it's super unsettling that he's largely unfazed.
So while there are some sweet moments, those scenes in the 100-acre wood are going to knock you RIGHT OUT. Bring a coffee.I read someone saying that this felt like a Terrence Malik film and that's not far off.
Also, my favourite character growing up was Rabbit and they've used a voice that doesn't sound at all like Rabbit used to sound like which is hugely displacing. Thank goodness he's barely in this. Pooh is perfect as is everyone's favourite Eeyore.
It's still good and it does have a few really magical moments that make it worth it in my opinion. But lots of it is hella boring. Emily really liked it and wants to see it again so there's that. At least I didn't have to see Hotel Transylvania Cruise Ship Edition.