Date: Fri 27-Feb-1998

Publication: Bee

Author: DONNAM

Quick Words:

Borrowers-Goodman-Playing

Full Text:

(rev "The Borrowers" for Now Playing)

Now Playing--

"Borrowers" Takes Kids Down Wrong Road For Laughs, But Still Wins

By Trey Paul Alexander III

Nobody wants to be a Grinch or a party-pooper. It's no fun to be the one to

rain on everyone else's parade. Yet that's the position I feel I'm in as I

review The Borrowers, a new family film currently playing in theaters. Though

there is little difficulty recommending this film as a viable, enjoyable

option for parents looking to take the kiddies to the movies, I must admit the

film failed to charm me and at times it came just short of being annoyingly

shrill and loud.

The Borrowers is based on a series of children's books, which first appeared

in 1952, by Mary Norton. She conceived of a world of 4-inch people, called

Borrowers, who are responsible for those misplaced socks, lost keys, missing

buttons, and all other household items that seemingly grow legs and walk away,

never to be found again. The Borrowers live under the floorboards and behind

the walls of the homes of regular-sized "human beans," and pilfer -- whoops! I

mean "borrow" -- tiny items to maintain and preserve their miniature

dwellings.

As a film, directed by Peter Hewitt ( Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey , Tom and

Huck ), The Borrowers follows the exploits of the Clocks -- father Pod (Jim

Broadbent), mother Homilly (Celia Imrie) and children Arietty (Flora Newbigin)

and Pea-green (Tom Felton) -- who live under the residence of the Lender

family. A crisis brews when the Lenders, who are unaware of the presence of

their tiny co-habitants, come up against an odious lawyer, Ocious P. Potter (a

deliciously hammy John Goodman), who wants to demolish their house and build

an apartment complex. Unbeknownst to the Lenders, but overheard by Arietty and

Pea-green, Potter has possession of a will that bequeaths the house to the

Lenders, and it is up to the Borrowers to defeat Potter and regain the deed to

the property.

If anything, The Borrowers proves that short people have purpose and plenty of

it, not to mention it gives credence to the adage, good things often come in

small packages (but then again, didn't Yoda prove that?). The movie does a

wonderful job of realizing the world of these minuscule people and

accomplishes a near seamless work of integrating the worlds of the Borrowers

and the "beans." In fact, if the film kept the same sense of moderate pacing

and limitless wonder it establishes in its first 20 minutes, it would no doubt

have been one of the better family films since Babe .

But alas, we eventually get treated to a preponderance of disagreeable, noisy

children who put their family in constant danger, heavy-handed slapstick

escapades, and even less subtle jokes involving dog poop and (here's the

topper!) canine flatulence! Why did the film have to go down that road?

Perhaps what also hinders the movie from my perspective is the far superior

adaptation of Mary Norton's tales that aired on television in the US a few

years ago on TNT. It starred excellent character actor Ian Holm as the

protective Borrower father and paced itself more carefully and sustained much

more wonder, heart and soul than this admittedly engaging, yet slightly

frustrating big-screen version.

The Borrowers , rated PG for slapstick violence and some uncouth scatological

humor, ultimately works so hard to be winning and is done with such exuberance

that it makes it hard to completely fault it for its lack of heart and warmth.

Goodman pours his considerable talents and frame into the role of the

cigar-chomping baddie, and alert viewers will welcome the appearance of

British character actors Mark Williams and Hugh Laurie, familiar to many as

the bumbling dognappers in the recent live-action reworking of 101 Dalmations

.