endy Darling (Hurd-Wood) may be the daughter of a banker in Edwardian London, but she's more interested in playing pirate with her two brothers, John and Michael. Aunt Millicent (Lynne Redgrave) disapproves, arguing that she'll never land a husband if she persists in her dream of becoming a novelist.
Timid Mr. Darling (Isaacs), meanwhile, tries to follow Millicent's advice to be more sociable as a way to advance in society. But when Wendy embarrasses him in front of his colleagues, he vows to become a man children fear and adults respect.
As Wendy lies in her bedroom, contemplating childhood's end, a strange boy appears at the window. He is Peter Pan (Sumpter), and he can fly! Wendy helps him recover his shadow and rescue his fairy companion, Tinker Bell (Ludivine Sagnier). She is tempted to give him a kiss. But instead she agrees to fly off with him to Neverland, where she can be like him: a child who never has to grow up. Tinker Bell becomes jealous.
With Wendy, Michael and John in tow, Peter takes to the night sky over London, heading for the second star to the right and straight on 'til morning.
Sitting on a pink cloud, the children observe a pirate ship in a Neverland cove. On deck, Captain Hook (Isaacs) orders his crew to fire at the cloud. As the children fall, Tinker Bell tells the Lost Boys that Wendy is a big bird, and that Peter has ordered them to shoot her down. They do, and Wendy plummets to earth with an arrow in her heart.
The pirates set out to find the children and Peter. The Lost Boys, meanwhile, find out that Wendy is all right. They ask her to be their mother and build a house for her in the forest.
But Captain Hook and his band of rogues are closing in. Peter tells the Darling children that the pirate fears only the crocodile that took his hand, a monster that swallowed a clock and continues to tick, tick, tick.
Definitely not your father's fairy tale
Peter Pan, from Australian director and co-writer Hogan, attempts to return the beloved fairy tale back to its roots in this live-action fantasy movie: the writings of English author J.M. Barrie. Hogan, an avowed Barrie scholar, hews closely to the themes and characters of Barrie's original play and novel, which may come as a revelation to those familiar only with the sanitized Disney animated version of the story. (Hogan is not above altering the text, however, with the addition of the character of Aunt Millicent, played by veteran actress Redgrave.) Hogan's Pan is both innocent and sensual, playful and violent and, at times, very dark and creepy.
Key to this version is the decision to cast a real boy in the role of Peter, a part traditionally played by a mature woman, and to reflect Barrie's own casting of the same actor as Mr. Darling and Captain Hook. This dual casting in part reflects the Freudian psychology of Barrie's original tale, which centers on the budding adolescence of Wendy and her conflicted feelings about growing up. Mr. Darling/Hook represents both the most attractive elements of adulthood and the most fearsome. Isaacs, best known to fantasy fans as the reptilian Lucius Malfoy of the Harry Potter movies, is well suited to play both the milquetoast Darling and the charmingly nefarious Hook.
But the decision to put newcomer Sumpter in the role of Peter undercuts Hogan's ambitions. Sumpter feels too old to play the eternal 12-year-old, and his rudimentary acting skills aren't up to the task of illuminating Peter's complex emotional inner life. Hurd-Wood's performance as Wendy, by contrast, is note-perfect: She's a radiant natural talent who puts one in mind of a young Kate Beckinsale, and she's quite a find.
Hogan (Muriel's Wedding) also makes some odd directing choices that hurt the film. The action, though well staged, feels more like a Tex Avery cartoon than an English adventure story. The production design for Neverland and the fantasy sequences—perhaps meant to evoke the stagy backdrops of Barrie's original play—nevertheless goes too far, all pink clouds and smiling suns and Maxfield Parrish landscapes. It works against the tale's themes and also contrasts too sharply with the more realistic depiction of Edwardian London. And there are a few jarring anachronisms, such as head butts and a character sneering, "You're history."
