Tim Burtons recent efforts with the Alice In Wonderland and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory tales have not endeared me to him in a way that his earlier work such as Edward Scissorhands did but at least there’s no Johnny Depp appearance this time.

Instead we follow Jake Portman (Asa Butterfield), a loner of a boy who feels like he doesn’t belong and is lost in life. He has always had a very close relationship with his grandfather Abe (Terence Stamp) who has tried to shield his nephew from his apathetic parents through his tales of travelling the world and in particular with his re-counting of a school, run by a woman who can transform into a bird called Miss Peregrine where the children are all unusual and have certain traits that make them stand out. Jake has never been sure if these tales are figments of his grandfathers imagination so while the rest of society believes that his grandfather is losing his marbles and has always been a story-teller Jake believes that there just may be something in these stories. Then, when Abe dies under suspicious circumstances, he begins to suspect that something sinister may have occurred so he convinces his father Franklin (Chris O’Dowd), with the help of his psychologist to head to Wales as part of this therapy to deal with his grief over the death. While there, Jake wants to establish first hand if there was any reality to the stories.

Burtons take on the Ransom Riggs novel has all the ingredients to be a dark tale which is usually right up his street but it falls a bit flat as, despite the potential the unusual ‘gifts’ that the children have it’s all been seen before (Professor Xavier school for gifted mutants) and for all of their unusualness there is nothing really memorable about them. We have Emma (Ella Purnell) who can manipulate air, Olive Abroholos Elephanta (Lauren McCrostie) who is a pyrokinetic, Fiona Frauenfeld (Georgia Pemberton) who can control nature, Claire Densmore (Raffiella Chapman) who has a mouth on the back of her head, Millard Nullings (Cameron King) an invisible boy, Bronwyn Buntley (Pixie Davies) a small child with super human strength and a few other all of whom are cute and charming but nothing special in reality. However the most original and interesting character for me was Enoch O’Connor (Finlay MacMillan) whose gift is being able to bring inanimate objects to life in a kind of reverse Taxidermy yet is given little to do with his skill for most of the movie and spends the majority of the film acting as the grumpy older kid who feels threatened by the new arrival and his developing bond with Emma.

A big problem for me was the central character of Jake, not that there was anything wrong with the acting as Butterfield was fine in the role, but Jake himself who is the only person who can see the Hollows and thus acts as a protector for the group, always felt like an outsider. His work around to allow the group see the creatures was fairly obvious and didn’t really require and special talents so he felt a bit unnecessary and only really served as the conduit from the past to the present. Plus we never got to see any real acting range from Butterfield and considering his performances in The Boy In the Striped Pyjamas and Hugo that was quite disappointing.

The savior of the film is Miss Peregrine (Eva Green) or, Alma LeFay Peregrine to give the character her full name, who is both mysterious and captivating as the pipe smoking head of the house who controls the time loop which keeps the children safe and also holds the knowledge to Jake’s background. Green does a great job in making the character her own as her mannerisms, speech patterns and clothing all paint the picture of somebody who is much more than she seems upon initial impression. Warm and caring one moment but who will take whatever measures she need to in order to keep the children from harm.

Also, adding his two cents as Mr.Barron is Samuel L.Jackson who once again shows that you could put him in any rubbish and he would still be able to bring elements of class to a role, as he is both terrifying and hilarious in equal measures as the eyeball eating, slightly mad leader of the evil Wights

The movie suffers from not being one thing or another as the supposed good versus evil battle only ever really manifests itself during the climactic finale on Blackpool pier but even then it’s played with a certain level of comedy so that it never really feels like there is any sense of serious drama in the situation which leaves the movie as a children’s romp with typical Burton dark tones but no real sense of adventure about what could have been an exciting time travel story with characters who have special powers, but then again I have just described a kids version Days Of Future Past?

DJ Speaks Rating: 4.5 Out Of 10

©  Darren Jones 2016