Winnie The Pooh, or a big steaming pile of Poo?

There have been plenty of Winnie The Pooh adaptations over the years, and other movies featuring some of Pooh’s friends…but this is the first time that the stories have been given the “Live Action” treatment.

Ewan McGregor plays an older Christopher Robin who now has his own life with a wife, a child and a big city job. He hits an impasse in life, with a job gearing him up to fire half the workforce, and problems with him not being very close to his wife and daughter.

That’s when Pooh turns up, having lost all his friends. Christopher Robin heads off through the tree to the Hundred Acre Wood to help him search for them.

It’s a fun adventure, albeit a very predictable one.

In fact, the whole moral of the story about realising that people and family are more important than work-life has been done so many times. I was almost expecting McGregor to punch a top hat through and spout “Supercalifrajalisticexpialidocious” in one climactic scene which could have been lifted straight out of Mary Poppins.

It comes back to Disney and the studio’s parent-issues being the main focus of any story. Look through most Disney films and there’s some kind of child with a missing parent, whether physically missing or metaphorically, and this, I believe is something which goes all the way back to Walt Disney’s actual life.

Did you also know that the main characters all personify different mental illnesses?

Winnie The Pooh : ADHD
Piglet : Anxiety
Eeyore : Persistant Depressive Disorder
Owl : Dyslexia
Tigger : Recurring pattern of risk taking
Rabbit : Narcissism

Keep all those in mind when you watch the films next.

So back to this film, it’s very watchable and has a lot going for it, but that whole predictability just really took me out of it somewhat. Eeyore completely steals all the funniest lines in the film and is worth seeing it for him alone…I want more Eeyore!

3/5