Cuentos que no son cuento

We went to this movie with my two kids (ages 7 and 10, both girls), my Brother-in-law and his wife and their two kids (ages six and nine, both boys.) We were a bit apprehensive about this due to the poor critics ratings on Rotten Tomatoes. (Frankly, the critics gave it abysmal ratings and I almost avoided this entirely because of those ratings.) And perhaps they were right. But I know that despite the critics we all enjoyed it greatly. Maybe it was just the mood we were all in or the good meal we just had before the movie but we laughed throughout. Obviously there is no high-brow humor here or social commentary to be made. It's just a movie who's sole purpose is simply to have fun.

Cookie cutter? Perhaps. In fact, in retrospect I'm sure it was. But it was still enjoyable.

So if your looking for something more than what you see in the previews, forget it. It isn't happening. This movie makes no pretenses about what it is exactly about: good fun. If your looking for anything other than that, you're going to be disappointed.

On the down side, some of the best moments were captured in the previews. While this certainly isn't the first movie to this (not the last I'm sure), it always seems to take something away from the experience of watching the movie. But there were plenty of other twists and turns in this movie that helped minimize the effect this had on the overall viewing experience.

Overall this movie was a delight for kids both big and small in our group. You'll enjoy it if you watch it with a child's eye...and not those big ones Bugsy has!!!

Despite being a much milder and family-friendly flick, Bedtime Stories will not disappoint Adam Sandler fans provided they accept that they have to share him with a much younger audience as well.

Bedtime Stories is a PG-rated comedy about hotel maintenance guy Skeeter Bronson (Adam Sandler), who babysits his impossibly cute niece Bobbi (Laura Ann Kesling) and nephew Patrick (Jonathan Morgan Heit) for his uptight sister Wendy (Courteney Cox). He shares his duties with Wendy's co-teacher/friend Jill (Keri Russell), taking on the night shift, which is when he discovers that the stories he tells them come true the next day. Skeeter uses his new discovery to his advantage when he decides to create a happier ending for his own life, which is made miserable daily by his hotel nemeses Kendall (Guy Pearce) and Aspen (Lucy Lawless).

Sure, the scenarios are pretty ridiculous sometimes, but indulging in children's fantasies is a longlost pleasure that this famcom creates for his adult audience, while wisely introducing Sandler to his future audiences by appearing in a diluted version of himself. If you're not into warm-and-fuzzies (why fight it?!?), you might find this too saccharine for your moldy taste buds.

"What if the stories you told came to life?" Bedtime Stories Promo

Having suffered through Adam Sandler's You Don't Mess with the Zohan (2008), I was prepared to suffer through Bedtime Stories, his offering in the 2008 Christmas glut of fine movies that have few for kids. Sandler rules: This is one of the best children/adult stories this year, an ironic twist on romantic and heroic tales told from children's point of view through the masterful child/adult lens of an underplaying, child-friendly master.

Sandler's Skeeter Bronson takes care of his niece and nephew for a week. Of course he hasn't a clue because he hasn't seen them in four years and his job as super-maintenance man at the Sunny Vista Hotel in Las Vegas consumes most of his time and energy. He's the usual Sandler sweet-hearted semi-loser with reserves of child-like sympathies ready to be released.

The conceit is that after telling the humorous tales with the kids' ample and creative input at bedtime, the story elements become real in real life, altered to fit the modern context (e.g., a rain of gumballs actually happens the next day, explainable by a candy truck spilling its contents over a bridge onto Sandler). In this ingenious way, the film recalls the Wizard-of-Oz trick of making real in Kansas what Dorothy had experienced in the Emerald City.

There is nothing deep about this delight, just a small satire of a society that may be losing its sense of wonder and fun in order to bow at the altars of nutrition and commercialism. Not bad for a film I thought would be another Sander nodder. It woke me up to the joys of imagination and love.

Happy holidays.

In 1974, Marty Bronson (Jonathan Pryce) builds the Sunny Vista Motel in Los Angeles, California, with the intention of raising his son Skeeter and his daughter Wendy in the place where he works. However he is not a good businessman and the hotel goes bankruptcy. Marty is forced to sell his motel to Barry Nottingham (Richard Griffiths) that promises to hire Skeeter in a general manager position when he grown up. Years later, Barry builds a new hotel; forgets his promise to Marty; and Skeeter Bronson (Adam Sandler) is only the handyman of his hotel. The general manager is the arrogant Kendall (Guy Pearce), who is engaged with the shallow Barry's daughter Violet Nottingham (Teresa Palmer).

When the Webster Elementary School where Wendy (Courteney Cox) is the principal will be closed to be demolished, she needs to travel to Arizona for a job interview. Wendy asks her friend Jill (Keri Russell), who is teacher in the same school, to watch her son Patrick and her daughter Bobbi during the day and Skeeter to watch them during the night. Skeeter meets the estranged kids with his best friend Mickey (Russell Brand) and makes up bedtime stories to help them to sleep but the kids add details to the stories, changing their endings. Soon Skeeter realizes that the plot of the stories are coming true and affecting his life. Meanwhile Barry Nottingham decides to give a change to Skeeter to dispute the manager position in his new hotel with Kendall like in one of his stories. But Skeeter has told to his nephew and his niece that stories do not have happy endings.

"Bedtime Stories" is a family entertainment from the Disney Studios surprisingly good. Adam Sandler is very funny in this fantasy and it is impressive how this actor that is not handsome and actually has a sort of stupid face shines with his charisma. I have seen most of his movies and enjoyed most of them.

Based on the Metascore (33/100), I dare to say that fortunately I am not a professional critic. "Bedtime Stories" is not a movie to win awards in any film festival but is a delightful fantasy to be appreciated by those that have the concept of family and dreams. It might be very sad to have the absence of these feelings in the heart and give such low rating to this beautiful fantasy. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Um Faz de Conta que Acontece" ("A Make Beliefe that Happens")

I was expecting another tacky platitude, similar to the unwatchable "Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium", the unacceptable "Night at the Museum", the sugary "Charlotte's Web", and sundry other brainless and uninspired productions of the recent years which seem to bank on the medieval idea that children would be some gullible half-morons willing to swallow even the most awkward smoke-and-shadows games... Well, NO! "Bedtime Stories" is NO bedtime story - it's not meant to put anyone to stuporous sleep, being instead witty, energizing and fully enjoyable! The script is intelligent, with a solid structure and flexible articulations, and the directing, more than adequate: precise to a point, expressive, spirited and brilliant. In many senses, it reminded me the well-being that I've always been owing to the Zemeckis' "Back to the Future" trilogy: a movie that simply makes you feel full of buoyancy! I hate such politically correct (read: efficiently brainwashing) labels as "family movies", so I state it clearly: it's a good movie for children of all ages - from 3 to 83!