CAST: Jim Carrey, Carla Gugino, Maxwell Perry Cotton, Andrew Stewart-Jones, Curtis Shumaker; DIRECTOR: Mark Waters; WRITERS: Sean Anders, John Morris; GENRE: Comedy; RUNNING TIME: 95 minutes.Technical Assessment: 4
Moral Assessment: 4
CINEMA Rating: For viewers age 13 and below with parental guidance.
Mr. Popper (Jim Carrey) is an adroit dealer on architecture and real estate who receives six penguins as a gift. Divorced from his wife Amanda (Carla Gugino) and living alone in a swank New York apartment, he considers the creatures pests, not pets, and decides to donate them to the local zoo. But before he can make arrangements for the penguins to be hauled out, his children, teener Janie (Madeline Carroll) and Billy (Maxwell Perry Cotton), on one weekend visit, fall in love with the birds in his flat. Thinking the penguins are Mr. Popper’s surprise gift to their son celebrating his birthday, his whole family is most touched. Mr. Popper does not have the heart to disappoint his children, especially as the penguins’ presence endears him to his family, so he decides to keep the birds in his apartment, turning the place into a perpetual winter wonderland in an effort to simulate the penguins’ natural habitat while providing weekend fun for his children.
Mr. Popper’s Penguins is based on the time-honored children’s classic novel by Richard and Florence Atwater about a boy (Popper Jr.) whose explorer-father made up for his absence (especially at the boy’s birthday celebrations) with gifts and souvenirs from all over the globe. The story combines fantasy and heart, and is anything but frivolous, thanks to the spot-on casting that makes for credible characters with real life feelings. It is a mellowed Carrey that the Mr. Popper character calls for and projects quite successfully; thus Carrey fans may be disappointed to see very little of the usual antics of the rubbery-faced comedian but they may be delighted to find that the actor can actually deliver convincing drama, too, without being fake or syrupy about it. Perhaps Carrey was actually spurred to real acting by working with real Gentoo penguins which the movie reportedly used, drastically cutting down dependence on CGI. It is hard to tell when the penguins are computer-generated or are displaying good training, something that should be credited to director Mark Waters and, of course, to seamless editing. Noteworthy of close watch is that part where Mr. Popper and his children keep vigil to watch the penguin eggs hatch.
Although Mr. Popper’s Penguins is aimed at children, its message is for adults as well, particularly parents having difficulty coping with family situations. The Carrey character—the young Popper father—unwittingly risks becoming exactly like his explorer father by his preoccupation with his career, which, in fact, has cost him his wife and family. The arrival of the penguins—which Mr. Popper actually inherits from his globe-trotting father—is a grace that enables the dead man to make up for lost time and to help towards making his divorced son see what matters most in life. It augurs well for modern society that the book published in 1938 and presumably upholding family values in that era has reentered the scene as a film after 73 years, refocusing the limelight on those same values that present day families want and need to revive. CINEMA recommends Mr. Popper’s Penguins for 97 minutes of family fun and profit. Perhaps then you would wish for a Mr. Popper’s Penguins II to see what eventually happens to the baby penguins, at least.
