Peter Pan (2003 film)

Peter Pan is a 2003 fantasy adventure film directed by P.J. Hogan and written by Hogan and Michael Goldenberg. The screenplay is based on the 1904 play and 1911 novel "Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up" by J.M. Barrie. Jason Isaacs plays the dual roles of Captain Hook and George Darling, Olivia Williams plays Mary Darling, while Jeremy Sumpter plays Peter Pan, Rachel Hurd-Wood plays Wendy Darling, and Ludivine Sagnier plays Tinker Bell. Lynn Redgrave plays a supporting role as Aunt Millicent, a new character created for the film.
After completing the script, Hogan and Goldenberg were given approval by Great Ormond Street Hospital, who held the rights to Barrie's story. Principal photography took place in Australia at Village Roadshow Studios on the Gold Coast, Queensland from September 2002 to May 2003.
"Peter Pan" premiered at the Empire in Leicester Square, London on 9 December 2003 and was theatrically released by Universal Pictures, Columbia Pictures, and Revolution Studios in the United Kingdom on 24 December 2003 and in the United States on 25 December 2003. The film received positive reviews from critics but only grossed $122 million worldwide. With an estimated budget of $130.6 million (not including marketing costs), the film was a box office bomb resulting in a $70–95 million loss.
Plot.
In 1904, in the nursery of the Darling household located in London, England, Wendy Darling tells stories of Peter Pan to her younger brothers John and Michael before their Aunt Millicent's arrival. Judging Wendy to be an "almost" full-grown woman, Aunt Millicent advises Mr. and Mrs. Darling that Wendy should be given her own bedroom. At school, Wendy is caught by her teacher, daydreaming with a drawing she made after supposedly seeing Peter in the night. The school sends a letter about this to Wendy's father at the bank. In an attempt to stop the messenger boy from delivering the letter with the help of the family's nurse dog Nana, Wendy embarrasses her father in front of his superiors. As punishment, Mr. Darling chains Nana outside and declares that it is time for Wendy to grow up and have a room of her own.
Peter visits the nursery looking for his shadow, which Nana had bitten off during his previous visit. He introduces himself to Wendy, who sews his shadow back on. Peter invites her and her brothers to Neverland where Wendy can tell stories to his gang of Lost Boys. They agree and are taught to fly using Tinker Bell's fairy dust. Nana breaks free from her chain and leads Mr. and Mrs. Darling back home from a party, but they arrive too late to stop the children flying away. Captain Hook and his crew are alerted to Peter's return and fire their cannons, knocking Wendy far away and causing Michael and John to fall towards the island. Jealous of Wendy's presence, Tinker Bell tricks the Lost Boys into shooting Wendy with arrows as she is falling from the sky. To their relief, Wendy survives as the arrow hits her acorn necklace. However, Peter banishes Tinker Bell and ends their friendship.
Wendy awakens and agrees to be the Lost Boys' mother. They lead her to their hideout, but realize her brothers are missing. Michael and John encounter the Native American princess Tiger Lily and all three are then captured by Hook and his crew, and taken to the Black Castle. Peter and Hook engage in a duel, but it is stopped when the ticking crocodile arrives and tries to eat Hook, allowing the children to all escape. After a celebration at the Native American camp, Peter shows Wendy the fairies' home and the two share a dance. Hook spies on the two and charms Tinker Bell, still hurt over her banishment. Peter becomes upset with Wendy after she tries to get him to express his feelings. He tells her to leave, refusing to believe that he can ever love and grow up. Tinker Bell leads Hook's men to Wendy's makeshift "house" and they carry Wendy to his ship. There, he tries to entice her to become a pirate, but sends a spy to follow her to the Lost Boys' underground hideout afterwards. Wendy persuades her brothers to return home and are joined by the Lost Boys. Later, she leaves an upset Peter a cup of "medicine".
Wendy exits the hideout only to be ambushed and captured by Hook's crew. Hook enters the hideout and poisons Peter's medicine. However, Tinker Bell intervenes, drinking the poison instead, and succumbs to it. Peter asserts his belief in fairies, which reaches out to residents of London, bringing Tinker Bell back to life. Peter and Tinker Bell save Wendy and the boys from walking the plank by the pirates and a battle soon breaks out. Hook uses fairy dust to fight Peter in a duel while flying and taunts him about Wendy abandoning him and forgetting all about him when she grows up. Weakened by those thoughts and unable to fight, Peter Pan is incapacitated. A kiss from Wendy revives Peter and he finally defeats Hook, who falls into the jaws of the crocodile.
With the ship covered in fairy dust, Peter flies Wendy and the boys back to London. Mr. and Mrs. Darling are overjoyed at the return of their children, and adopt the Lost Boys. Slightly, who got lost on the way to London and arrives at the house too late, is adopted by Aunt Millicent. Peter promises never to forget Wendy and to return some day before heading back to Neverland with Tinker Bell. Wendy, as the adult narrator, claims she never saw Peter again, but she continues to tell his story to her own children and grandchildren so that his legacy will last forever.
Production.
Development.
The film is dedicated to Dodi Al-Fayed, who was executive producer of the 1991 film "Hook". Al-Fayed planned to produce a live action version of Peter Pan, and shared his ideas with Princess Diana (who was President of Great Ormond St Hospital), who said she "could not wait to see the production once it was underway." Al-Fayed's father, Mohammed Al-Fayed, co-produced the 2003 adaptation of the tale after his son died in the car crash which also killed Princess Diana. "Finding Neverland", a film about J. M. Barrie and the creation of Peter Pan, was originally scheduled to be released in 2003, but the producers of this film – who held the screen rights to the story – refused permission for that film to use scenes from the play unless its release was delayed until the following year.
Casting.
Contrary to the traditional stage casting, the film featured a young boy in the title role. Since the first stage production of the story, the title role has usually been played by a woman, a tradition followed in the first film adaptation. Two subsequent animated adaptations have featured a male voice actor as Peter Pan, and a Soviet live-action film adaptation for television cast a boy to play the role. This film was the first live-action theatrical release with a boy playing the part. The casting of a single actor to play both George Darling and Captain Hook follows a tradition also begun in the first staging of the play.
Brie Larson originally auditioned for Wendy Darling.
Filming.
Principal photography began on 17 September 2002 and concluded on 5 May 2003, taking place entirely inside sound stages on Australia's Gold Coast, Queensland. According to Fisher, the decision to shoot in Australia was based on the low value of the Australian dollar at that time.
Hogan had originally planned on filming in a variety of locations such as Tahiti, New Zealand, and London but abandoned this idea after scouting some of the locations.
Filming on sound stages did help "retain some of the theatricality of the original play", something which Hogan thought was important.
Visual effects.
The visual effects in the film are a mixture of practical and digital. The fairies that appear in the film are actors composited into the film with some digital enhancements. According to actor Jason Isaacs, the filmmakers were impressed with actress Ludivine Sagnier's performance and decided to abandon their plans to make Tinker Bell entirely computer animated. The film also features a large, computer-generated crocodile. Another character, an animatronic parrot, appears in some scenes on the pirate ship. A complex harness was built to send the live-action actors rotating and gliding through the air for the flight sequences. They were then composited into the shots of London and Neverland, although they are sometimes replaced with computer-generated figures. One other aspect of bringing the story to life was the complex sword-fighting sequences, for which the actors were trained. Sumpter said that, "I had to train for five months before the shoot. I had to do harness training to learn how to fly and learn how to swordfight," and that, "I got stabbed a couple of times with a sword." Hogan says that the flying scenes were very difficult to accomplish, but that, "it was tougher on the kids than it was for me. They were up there on the harness 12' off the ground, having to make it look like flying is easy and fun." Sumpter grew several inches over the course of the film's production, requiring staging tricks to retain Hook's height advantage over Peter in face-to-face scenes late in the process. Hollywood-based producer Lucy Fisher also said that, "The window he flies out of had to be enlarged twice."
Release.
This film was released in theatres on 18 December 2003 in Australia, on 24 December 2003 in the United Kingdom and on 25 December 2003 in the United States. The film was distributed by Universal Pictures in the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, France, and South Africa, and by Columbia Pictures in the rest of the world. While Universal distributed the film theatrically in France, the home video rights are handled by Sony there.
Marketing.
For the promotion of the film, the original novel of "Peter Pan" by J.M. Barrie was re-released displaying the film's promotional material. A video game based on the film was released for Game Boy Advance on 4 November 2003, receiving mixed reviews from critics.
Reception.
Critical response.
Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a score of 76% based on 144 reviews, and an average rating of 6.8/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Solid if far from definitive, this version of "Peter Pan" is visually impressive, psychologically complex and faithful to its original source." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 64 out of 100, based on 33 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".
Film critic Roger Ebert gave the film three and a half out of four stars. MovieGuide has also favourably reviewed the film, calling it "a wonderfully crafted, morally uplifting movie that intentionally emphasizes the fantasy elements of the story both in dialogue and design of the film."
Box office.
"Peter Pan" earned $48,462,608 at the box office in the United States and another $73.5 million outside the US, which brings the worldwide total to nearly $122 million. The film’s failure was partly due to its competition from the highly anticipated "" released the week before, and "Cheaper by the Dozen", which opened on the same day.
Accolades.
Visual Effects Society Awards.
Giles Hancock