Histoires enchantées

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!!!

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")

The thing about Bedtime Stories is that it is light, funny, easy to digest and all around great for the whole family.

It's just like any other Sandler's movies except this one doesn't contain any only-for-adults jokes.

It might not be the movie I'd recommend to someone who is in for something serious or something that is seriously funny, but this movie has got it all. There's comedy, slight drama and a lot of action; from cowboys to the outer space.

Great writing and great acting.

Really, there's nothing to complain. It's just a very entertaining family movie, which we don't get a lot these days.

I recommend Bedtime Stories to any Disney fans and also to anyone who'd enjoy Adam Sandler's movies, minus the sexual and dirty jokes.

Bedtime Stories' script is magnificently written. It has huge character arcs, tent poles, and humor. It can't get better. Only, it feels, at times, it overdoes a little. Overdoes the character arcs, the fiction. It, sometimes, becomes not believable, which is the only complaint I have from the Writer. I can even count the many times it has overdone such moments.

Now, Adam Sandler, has done a remarkable job. He stands tall, gives his best and delivers yet another amazing characrer with a spectacular movie.

Of course, family movies can get way better than this one is, however, it keeps gripping the audience right till the end. Nonetheless, the climax is exceptional too.

Skeeter is a guy that worked hard all his life for a hotel his dad used to own. He's got high hopes to gain full control over it some day as that was promised to his father by the new owner. Many years have gone by and he's still in a low position though.

Due to circumstances Skeeter has to take care of his niece and nephew for a short while and the young kids prove to be a bit of a challenge for him, but he manages to do it. They demand a bed time story every night, and he gives it to them. He makes up stories himself, but soon all kind of weird things start happening.

And so on. The film rolls on like any typical Disney film. There's the backing story of a "hero" having to "rescue" some people in distress, there's the villain and the regular injustice. Added to that is the funny implications of what happens when a made up story becomes true. This addition gives this film some good laughs, and all in all it works out well enough, worthy of cinema time but not much more than that.

6 out of 10 gum-ball rain showers