Exactly what a tesseract is, and how it functions, and where it takes them, is under-defined, summed up in vagaries about lightspeed and quantum mechanics. We could tell by their squeals. The writer’s use of language itself is a part of the magic.
Advertisement
“There is a difference between the voice in your head and the voice in your heart”, said Oprah Winfrey to the TheGrio. “They gave me a long time to write it, and didn’t put any pressure on me”.
See you at the movies! DuVernay and her scripters have done nothing to address this problem, despite co-star Oprah Winfrey’s increasingly tiresome efforts to hide gaping narrative gaps via portentous declarations that sound like they were cribbed from discarded fortune cookies. She added that “A Wrinkle in Time” is an adventure about finding out what’s out there in the universe that we haven’t yet explored – and that’s kind of what she’s doing with her career.
Ava DuVernay is at her best when she’s creating dramatic moments, and those are the scenes in A Wrinkle in Time that work best.
That being said, A Wrinkle in Time looked like it had a lot going for it. He’s been gone four years, during which time Meg has become a sullen loner – underachieving at school, getting picked on by the mean girls, and friendless with the exception of the ever-optimistic Charles Wallace. Not only that, this Meg hears that she is powerful, that she is special, that everything she thought was a fault is a strength. “She makes the most distant dreams and ideas a reality”, Coogler wrote. For the uninitiated, it’s hard to grasp one of the many threads and hold on as it’s on to the next chapter before there was even time to become familiarized with this one. Which (Winfrey), who is clearly the leader of the Magical Mrs., and is like, 25 feet tall.
DuVernay’s casting instincts are good. Every teen who feels like an awkward misunderstood outsider will identify with Meg, played winningly by Storm Reid.
Reese Witherspoon shape-shifting into an oversized flower-dragon-slash-flying-carpet? Who (Mindy Kaling) – reveal to Meg and friends that the universe contains “tesseracts”, which allow them to cover tens of light years of distance instantly via a process called “Tessering”. It’s a film that has great messages, visual concepts, and sincerity, but lacks the balance in plot and character development to pull them off completely.
Pine plays the dad, who is missing, which prompts a visit from three witches – Mrs. Whatsit, Mrs. The Medium’s world of precariously balanced crystals is one of several compelling visual moments DuVernay and her crew conjure, but the film is so disjointed that it can not sustain any momentum for long.
Granted, L’Engle’s book needed fleshing out, and an attempt at some sort of continuity that would resonate with modern viewers. A Wrinkle in Time gets credit for its willingness to take chances and feel different from typical blockbusters. She was a devout Christian with the education to understand cutting edge science; one way to look at A Wrinkle In Time is as her attempt to reconcile the revelations of cosmology and quantum mechanics with old fashioned American transcendentalism. Her empowerment comes in bite-size bromides that might make an adult roll his eyes but seem just right for a middle-schooler: you’re so smart; you don’t know how great you are; you can do this, you’re just choosing not to; you’ve got great hair!
Advertisement
“Because it is not just one thing”. As she learned this, she opened her mind to realize that nothing was her fault and that life will get better for her. In her initial appearance in the Murry’s backyard, Mrs.
