James and the Giant Peach

James and the Giant Peach is a stop motion/live action adaptation of the late Roald Dahl's book in the early 60s when being transitioned into film (like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The BFG, The Witches, Matilda, and The Fantastic Mr. Fox) about a young boy named James, who climbs into the peach and meets anthropomorphic stop-motion insects and stumbles upon an adventure of a lifetime. Many critics and fans of Roald Dahl alike were amazed about how faithful this movie was to the book, but there are two problems that I do have with this adaptation.

1) The beginning was quite dark and might frighten younger kids along with other scenes.

2) The rhino in the sky and the scene where James battles it wasn't explained enough. That's it for the criticism.

The positive aspects of this movie were excellent. The live action sets and the stop-motion animation have an astounding charm to the book. The character designs are pretty unique and the Jack Skellington cameo as the captain of the skeletons was amazing. The acting is very superb. The stop-motion insects were good, the two mean aunts named Spike and Sponge were tolerable, and the main character James is very likable. Even the action is very good. Music/songs written by Randy Newman (The Toy Story trilogy, The Princess and the Frog) were surprising good. Although not a masterpiece, James and the Giant Peach is an enjoyable family entertainment that stays faithful to the story from a great author.

8/10

As a child James and the Giant Peach was one of my favorite books, so it was interesting to see how it would be formatted into a film. They actually did a pretty good job, although the book is much better. The animation was nicely done, and I liked the way the characters changed from life form to animated form- it gave the film a real surreal type of film. The songs were quite poor, and were obviously aimed at the kids to 'liven' things up a bit, after all some may say the story ventures on the dark side of things. It's nice to see a film aimed at children that can also appeal to adults as well, although it does help that many of us are very familiar with Roald Dahl's stories. In summary quite a good effort.

There is sooo much I like with this movie. It has imagination, a sense of wonder and characters you either love or hate. And the blend of live action and stop-motion animation is a delight. The songs incorporated in this story is not very memorable but sweet and fit their purpose. And you simply have to love to hate Margoyles and Lumley in their parts as the aunts from hell. They treat poor James so horribly that I thought that "Cinderella had it easy"! Compared to "nightmare before Christmas" I actually liked this movie better. It has more of a heart even if the story itself may be just a bit less interesting and inventive. There are so many good scenes but among the highlights is the arctic adventure and the New York sequence. But, mind you, the opening is very deceptive and might scare younger parts of the audience. Otherwise, a must-see!!!

The visual style is a bit "freaky" and the characters are a bit offbeat but that gives it some charm. I loved the banter between all the different insects who have a rivalry but are all good people. Their adventure is very engaging. The only downside is that sometimes the film is a bit over the top which makes it hard to empathise with James because his struggles can seem a bit comedic.

I don't know. This movie could have used a lot of work. It just wasn't good to me. I thought the storyline was a little out of date. For example, in the book, James' parents got killed by a rhino that ran away from the zoo. In this movie, it was a big rhino that literally came from the sky, and it symbolized something like James overcoming his fears. At the end of the movie, you were left asking yourself, "Huh?"

I guess the animation was cool, but the music was annoying. Let's be honest, Disney hasn't made any memorable songs since The Lion King. The music in this basically sucked. The song, "My Name Is James," was annoying. It just kept saying "James, James, James . . ." to the point where you would just want to put your fist through the movie screen. This movie could have been a lot better, and I guess it should have lived more up to the book. I don't know. It's just my opinion. I could be wrong.