In the early summer of 2010, Pixar topped off their golden decade with Toy Story 3, an allegedly heartbreaking work of staggering genius. I never saw it, but those seniors graduating high school one year above me did. They all cried, and they all talked about it. Friends of mine. It was an early, ominous sign of the steep decline in common intelligence among the general population, and confirmation that my generation, the Millennials, were as immature, unimaginative, and essentially useless as the media at the time insisted. The 15 years since the release of Toy Story 3 has seen the rise of proud “Disney Adults,” the replacement of arts and entertainment with politics as the pop culture of the English speaking world, the pathetic and embarrassing cowardice of Bernie Sanders, and the ceaseless fall into the void of smartphones and social media. Kids or no kids, marriage or not, the Millennials have yet to grab hold of the culture, and until they do, the world will have to suffer through even more garbage like The Goonies disinterred from the equally immature 1980s.
Pixar hasn’t done well lately, and their golden streak has long since passed; nevertheless, animation and “kids movies for adults” are more prevalent than ever. They shouldn’t exist. Kids movies should cater to children and their parents—not young adults about to leave home for college. Toy Story 3 may have been a good movie, I wouldn’t know, but it portended a disturbing trend in the culture at large, one that would reach its nadir with 2023’s Barbie, a movie based on a toy aimed at everyone but young kids. The night I saw Barbie, the Friday it opened, a middle-aged woman screamed upon entering, “WHO ELSE THINKS IT’S MESSED UP THAT THEY’RE PLAYING OPPENHEIMER IN THE BIG THEATER AND BARBIE IN HERE?” There’s no helping these people, they’re fried beyond belief; catering to their “tastes” is even more insane than acknowledging their crippling and self-defeating neuroses as anything but.
By all means, throw the baby out with the bathwater, but keep the rubber ducky and call him by his name: Paddington Bear. The second in a series of live action films based on the beloved British children’s character swept the nation in early-2018, one of many films to benefit from the histrionics of the anti-Trump #Resistance, a “pure” movie where adults could safely weep openly for around two hours in the dark. My family and I did, no doubt encouraged by back-to-back flights the previous day to a family funeral, but seven years later, we were still talking about the bear from Peru who loves marmalade—going to see the third movie, Paddington in Peru, was a no brainer. We all had a great time.
Paddington in Peru is on par with the previous film, perhaps better, only because Paddington spends so much less time in peril. After a distressing message from his aunt Lucy, still in Peru, Paddington and the Browns fly to Peru. This family, headed by Hugh Bonneville and Emily Mortimer, are saints, catering to Paddington and contorting their lives around him. The neighborhood loves him too, and who wouldn’t? Who ever heard of a talking bear?
Paddington’s a sweetheart, too: not at all stupid, but a bit naive; clumsy but lucky beyond belief; and, somehow, more charming than cute, a major achievement for a children’s character. As Liam Gaughan wrote for Splice Today earlier this week, the Paddington series is without cynicism, and this is perhaps its greatest strength. The films never go blue or crude, they offer as much for the curious and engaged child as the open-hearted adult, and Paddington himself (voiced by Ben Whishaw—likely the performance he’ll be remembered for) is one of recent cinema’s most endearing characters. Being around Paddington, watching a new movie starring him, it’s like you’re a plant being watered. He’s as real to me as the Quibbits roosters, who are actually real.
I do disagree with Gaughan that Paddington in Peru isn’t on par with its predecessors; if anything, this film allows Paddington and the Browns some fun after a harrowing beginning. They get to see Peru without too many hiccups, and there are no near misses or tough questions asked, situations posed. You’re invited to go on vacation with Paddington, however bumpy, and it’s a beautiful thing. You stop asking yourself questions and, for nearly two hours, you find yourself without cynicism as well. It doesn’t last long, but what a movie.
—Follow Nicky Otis Smith on Twitter and Instagram: @nickyotissmith