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New promos:
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New poster:
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New articles:
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https://www.mpaa.org/2018/11/the-nutcra ... -designer/
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I saw it last night -- it looks wonderful and Mackenzie Foy is a formidable lead, but the end result is just... meh. I can't tell if the movie's under-cooked or overcooked because it had two directors (with opposing visions, I assume), and yet certain characters and motivations weren't really explored well, and you don't really get to see much of the world/realms. Clara's reaction to the whole journey is baffling as well, she kind of acts like adventures like these happen to her every day and I got no sense of wonder and amazement from her. I also didn't appreciate the changes to the setting and the story, nor the twist villain. It's beyond annoying at this point, plus it keeps robbing us of great Disney villains.

The rest of the cast does well with what they've been given, and nobody is terrible so that's a plus I guess?

The most beautiful scene was the ballet sequence that tells the history of the four realms, but it was strangely cross-cut to include scenes of Clara visiting the realms. I feel the latter should have been turned into longer sequences of their own to help audiences get more immersed into the world.

Funny, that cheap Barbie version remains the best adaptation that I've seen.

I gave it a 5/10.

What was Keira Knightley like in it, if you don't mind me asking ?

Of course not . Keira was rather good, you can see she had a lot of fun with the role. Even the weird "baby talk" makes sense after seeing the movie. I just wish she had more screentime. The other three regents, too.

Then again, I’m kind of biased, because I would watch Keira read a phone book and probably like it.

Hey Mooky, thank you ! I'm glad she was good in it; we've not seen her play a role like this, so hoped she would be good.

I'm seeing it on Tuesday and am very much looking forward to it I must say !

I saw this last night and I have a few thoughts. As for overall, it’s very clear this movie was one thing and was changed to something else midway through production. There are some gaping holes, which I’ll cover in the spoilers. The pace is incredibly off. We’re suddenly thrust into the climax as soon as the movie is just starting to pick up, and it’s very jarring. But in a 90 minute movie, what do you expect? Two realms we never even visit, just see glimpses of Clara imagining herself in them for literally one to two shots a piece. We know there were whole sets built for these, they even talked about the kids eating pieces of the sets. Clearly a lot has been cut. There’s many shots not even in the movie that are in the trailers including the iconic shot of Clara looking back with the orange glow behind her. If you pay attention, you can clearly see the seams holding two different movies together. It’s very odd, and very disorienting at times.

There’s a real lack of magic as well. Drosselmeyer isn’t mysterious or creepy, he’s just a loving uncle. Clara has very little sense of wonder to this incredible world around her. As for the actual non-spoiler plot, it’s dull, and there’s simultaneously too much going on and too little. There is no room for development or exploration in this world. For more thoughts see the spoilers...

The biggest issue in the movie is Mother Ginger. She’s seen on screen for a whole 2 minutes before we realize she isn’t a bad guy. Even more so though is the fact that there’s no explanation how she was banished, how Sugar Plum convinced everyone she was bad, or how any of the fourth realm came to collapse and rot away.

There’s also a weird minor plot about shutting down the water flowing from the castle with no explanation as to why this needs to be done.

Structure wise the biggest issue is that the last half of the movie is really spent in the warehouse/lab where the villain twist goes down. It’s terrible looking and feels like a million other movies I’ve seen many times. We’re in this magical world, and instead the biggest things happen in a warehouse.

A few other shots missing too... Mother ginger sending the mice minions out, some more of Clara in the Orange glow by the water. I’m sure there’s more as well that I’m forgetting.

One last odd thing... the end after all is done and Clara becomes queen or something along those lines. She’s wearing her silver dress and she talks to the regents of the realms and then walks forward down a hall toward what I’m assuming is a crown of people we never see? And it cuts to her back in her party dress leaving. It makes no sense. You have no idea what she was doing or why she was dressed up or what on earth was taking place that day. Just another odd casualty of the directors switching I’m assuming?

Overall... this whole thing was such a missed opportunity. Nothing about it feels magical, there’s no holiday spirit, and honestly if I see another movie where the lead female is a clever inventor girl a la Beauty and the Beast I may lose my mind. It’s great to have strong female leads, but at least give them something to differentiate themselves. I’d love to see the original cut of the movie before the directors changed hands, because I feel like it at least had to have been more coherent or cohesive. Alas, that’ll never happen. I really thought I’d enjoy this, even with the reviews, but it really is such a lifeless retread of so many Disney live action tropes.

What makes this one so hard to swallow is the fact that after you’ve seen it, you can see how many easy ways there would have been to correct the issues with it. And the fact that extensive reshoots were done and we ended up with this is confusing. This cut feels like a cut that would have come if they had not done any reshoots. It feels cobbled together. Reshoots are done to fill gaps, change plot points and add some cohesion. And that is exactly what this movie lacks as a whole. Maybe a longer runtime would’ve fixed that? Maybe they didn’t have faith in the longer version so they cut it down hoping the shorter runtime would add to the box office because parents would bring children? I don’t know. But as it stands, it feels like a mess that could’ve been easily corrected. Such a disappointment.

Maybe they'll release an extended cut on Blu-ray?

I wonder who decided on the reshoots...and if the original director was not busy, how the reshoots would have been different than what we got.

I'm still really excited, even reading that it's underwhelming- keeping my fingers crossed!

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The other day I remembered that Miranda Hart was cast in a supporting role and she doesn't appear in the film at all. At least I didn't see her. That's another proof that a lot of the original footage must've been cut.


I also thought all that needed an explanation.


I think it was to prevent the machine from producing more toy soldiers, but I didn't understand why that was the only option. Wouldn't it have been more effective to stop it from inside the castle?


I doubt it. But maybe part of what was cut is included on the Blu-ray as deleted scenes and we can get an idea of how the movie was originally.


I think there are still things in the film to enjoy if your expectations aren't too high.

That puzzled me as well initially. Clara looked at the cogs moving after the Sugar Plum turned the water back on, so my best guess is that plot point was used to explain how she got the idea to rewire the machine.

Either that, or maybe there was originally a plan to have the mouse army come into the castle through those water tunnels. In any case, Mouse King was underutilized after it was built up as a strong adversary.

I completely agree with the rest of nomad2010's review.


Yes, I agree with this. The movie is not a total trainwreck, it just could have been much, much better.

I can't believe this is performing worse than A Wrinkle in Time. Here's hoping it will do better overseas.

Source: https://deadline.com/2018/11/bohemian-r ... 202494598/

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Lol, that's terrible. This film has been getting so much promotion that I'm surprised it's opening this low. At this point, I'm even wondering if it's worth watching after all the bad reviews people are giving it.


I actually like that version a lot and it's also my fav Nutcracker film that I've seen yet.

It’s surprising but not shocking. Word of mouth has been really effecting the box office over the past two years, in bigger ways than it had been. Look at a Star is Born just recently. It’s overtaking Venom at the box office, and is dropping only marginally each weekend. Plus, with rotten tomatoes, and the lack of commercials with accolades from critics endorsing it, I’m not shocked at all. If it had been a solid film, Disney would’ve screened it early, capitalized on the buzz, and marketed the positive reviews for everything they’re worth. Audiences are smarter than they give them credit for. Plus, families know the Nutcracker, and it’s very clear they’d messed drastically with the tale, and with the fairy tale fatigue after the middling Maleficent and Alice in Wonderland, I really don’t think audiences wanted to see a war movie Nutcracker. They want Christmas magic. And let’s be honest, it’s not even Thanksgiving yet. An odd time to release the movie in general. No one even wants to listen to Christmas music yet. Who’s going to go see a Christmas movie?

To be fair, The Grinch comes out next week...and Disney's probably banking on RBtI & MPR being huge holiday draws, during Thanksgiving/autumn break and winter break, respectfully.

I wonder what Disney's initial thoughts on making a Nutcracker movie were, how this film changed throughout pre-production/production, but I also wonder, again, if the original director came back for the reshoots, how much that would have affected the final film. I know even when the first trailer came out, this film was being compared to Alice in Wonderland's live action film; a classic story told with striking visuals, twists, darkness; I wonder if Disney had thought about approaching Tim Burton initially. I wonder: no matter the director, with the screenplay they had, would it have truly mattered? I wonder what the story is behind the actual story process of the film...were some people not happy with the screenplay and wanted to keep working on it, and the suits said that there's no more time, make the movie now?! Financially, not critically, following AiW's theming makes sense, because that movie made money, but critics didn't love AiW, either.

Oh, and with such great visuals in the film, I wonder why no art of book has been released (that I have found...unless they just don't make those for live action films).

It'll be interesting to see how the movie does this weekend. It makes you wonder, critics aside, if it were released nearer to Christmas, if more people would be inclined to see it.

For those of you who already saw it, how full was your theater?

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Disney's having a real hard time promoting the movie based on positive reviews. The best quotes they were able to find are "visually dazzling", "a visual spectacle", "wildly imaginative", and "entertaining".

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I think people are just over these glitzy fantasy films with horrible storylines that they try to make up for with amazing visuals. This is probably why Disney's smart to go the remake direction, because that extra push of nostalgia and brand recognition might actually sell a live-action fantasy and/or fairytale film.

I honestly was not expecting this to do well, but I was almost hoping to be wrong because everyone here seemed to be excited. Part of me will be happy if it does worse than A Wrinkle in Time though....

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Listening to most often lately:
Natasha Bedingfield ~ "A Little Too Much"
Maddie Poppe ~ "Not Losing You"
Celine Dion ~ "A New Day Is Dawning (Radio Remix)"

How come?

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The Nutcracker bombing will only make Disney even more reluctant to greenlight original fantasy films with a female lead. It will cement their belief that A Wrinkle in Time flopping wasn't a fluke; that it was because audiences only respond to popular brands and/or male leads. That's not a positive development, in my book. Prepare for an even bigger influx of sequels, remakes, and theme park adaptations in the future.

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Just because I liked the book and didn't think the film was that bad. I'd like it to at least not be at the very bottom (of course I didn't pay attention to Solo--did it do worse than AWiT?).

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Listening to most often lately:
Natasha Bedingfield ~ "A Little Too Much"
Maddie Poppe ~ "Not Losing You"
Celine Dion ~ "A New Day Is Dawning (Radio Remix)"

No, it didn't. Solo's opening was $84.4 million, A Wrinkle in Time's was $33.1 million, and from the looks of it, The Nutcracker will open at $20.2 million. Of course, when a male-led film flops the maleness of the film is never questioned or blamed. When a female-led film does, questions start popping up about the movie "skewing too female", "being too feminine" or "alienating men/boys" despite the fact that women constitute 50% of the movie-going public.

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Thanks, Sotiris! $275–300 million budget for Solo, $213,767,512 domestic box office, $171,561,550 international box office, so $385,329,062 combined.

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