Sometimes, even The A.V. Club isn't impervious to the sexy allure of ostensible cultural
garbage. Which is why there's I Watched This On Purpose, our feature exploring
the impulse to spend time with trashy-looking yet in some way irresistible entertainments,
playing the long odds in hopes of a real reward. And a good time.
Cultural infamy: It's
a G-rated movie called Mr. Goddamned Motherfucking Magorium's Cocksucking
Wonderfuckingporium starring a never-worse Dustin Hoffman as a
fantastical, magical, stupendical 234-year-old man-sprite who runs a toy store
with a life of its own. What more cultural infamy do you need? The only thing
that could make this less palatable or less appealing to black-hearted cynics
like myself would be calling it Patch Adams Too: The Quirkening. In an all-too-generous but otherwise dead-on C-
review, our own estimable Scott Tobias pointed out that the film "has a
familiarity that breeds contempt" and sagely notes that "just having a bunch of
inanimate objects zipping around the room only technically qualifies as magical."
Curiosity factor: I
liked Stranger Than Fiction, the high-concept scripting debut of Emporium writer-director Zach Helm. I also liked the
cast, especially stellar straight man Jason Bateman. Furthermore, my curiosity
was piqued when I walked past a Wendy's by my apartment during the film's
brief, undistinguished theatrical run and watched a child indifferently blow up
a Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium
blimp. It's a neat toy, but it nevertheless made me profoundly sad. I
envisioned the sad little boy sitting all by himself with his lonely little Mr.
Magorium's Wonder Emporium blimp while all
the other kids bathed in the life-giving blue light of HDTV plasma screens and
Sony PlayStations. While not technically a form of child abuse, exposing
children to the potentially fatal doses of whimsy and wonder coursing through Mr.
Magorium is questionable parenting at best.
The Wendy's blow-up blimp, meanwhile, is nothing but a cheap, plastic gateway
drug leading them to the film itself, which is the liquid cocaine of twee
preciousness.
The viewing experience: I'm invariably wary of movies where the production designer has the
most important job, as they tend to be heavy on spectacle and light on
substance. I'm even warier of movies where the production designer has the only
important job. Mr. Magorium is just such
a film. I'm wariest, meanwhile, of movies that try to uplift the soul and
unleash the viewer's inner child. Well, this is the soul-upliftiest,
inner-child-lovingest film to come down the pike in many a moon. A magical toy
store is a great beginning for a film, but here, the magical toy store is the
beginning, middle and end. Everything else feels secondary, almost irrelevant,
a textbook case of the tail wagging the dog.
In a performance that doubles as an all-too-convincing
argument for a mandatory retirement age for actors, Hoffman plays the eponymous
toy-store proprietor, an elfin man with a weakness for corny wordplay and
Successories-worthy aphorisms like "Life is an occasion. Rise to it."
Helm clearly expects audiences to instantly fall in love
with Hoffman, but I had the opposite reaction. I despised every cutesy,
gratingly adorable, insufferably life-affirming molecule of Hoffman's
performance, from an exaggerated lithsp that makes him sound like Rip Taylor
playing Willy Wonka to his caterpillar eyebrows, fluffy upturned hair, and
flamboyant wardrobe. To keep myself sane and awake during the film, I began
fantasizing that Hoffman's character was secretly a deranged sex criminal, and the
film would climax with a monologue where he'd tearfully confess "I'm actually a
thewial wapist who hath buwied the corpses of many a twanny hooker under the
fantastical, magical floor of this most goodest of esthablithments! Now let's
all dwink root-beer floats and jump up and down on the bed and raith Big Wheels!
And not weport any of this to the police, those big meanies!"
Just as movies with no sense of humor about themselves are
often unintentionally funny, a children's film that lacks even the faintest
trace of the eviscerating darkness found in the best kiddie entertainment
invites audiences to project their own neuroses onto it. The best kids' films
are the stuff of nightmares as well as dreams. Think Pinocchio or Pee-wee's Big Adventure (which I sincerely hope Scott covers in The New Cult
Canon) or The 5,000 Fingers Of Dr. T.
But Magorium doesn't have a dark
strand in its DNA: When the store turns black and dead after Hoffman deserts
it, it feels like nothing more than an obnoxious, ephemeral temper-tantrum from
an insolent child.
Hoffman has run his Wonder Emporium for ages, but he's
eager to pass over the reins to Natalie Portman— a frustrated former
piano prodigy who needs to "find her sparkle"—so he can ascend to heaven.
In yet another refreshing turn as the sole grown-up in a cast full of overly caffeinated
man-children and manic pixie dream girls, Jason Bateman—yes, Teen Wolf Too
himself—plays an accountant with a calculator for a heart and a ledger book
for a soul, who is burdened with cleaning up the store's financial records.
Will the magic and wonder of the emporium unleash Bateman's inner child? Will
Portman find the courage to, I dunno, find her heart-song or capture her
sparkle or whatever the fuck it is she's supposed to do? Last and least, will
an annoying little boy make some friends who aren't employed by a magical toy
store? Even laster and more leasty, will I be able to make it through this
goddamned film stone-cold sober, without commandeering a gun and shooting holes
in the screen, Fat Elvis-style?
Mr. Magorium is
full of ideas and images that must have sung on the page and wowed studio
executives gazing rapturously at the film's storyboards, but that fall
absolutely flat onscreen. For instance, the Federico Fellini-style strongman
who lives in the store's basement and makes all of its children's books. The
film's production design constitutes a full-on assault on the senses, with its
headache-inducing onslaught of bright colors, shiny spinning things, and manic
mischief bursting from every corner of the frame. Yet I couldn't help but think
that if the average child were given a choice between spending the afternoon in
a toy store where the merchandise magically comes to life, or zoning out with Grand
Theft Auto IV, they'd choose the video game nine times out of 10.
It's like Santa Claus The Movie:
If Santa's competitor were offering magical flying candy, I'd be all "Fuck
Sanity Clause. Little Nate Dogg wants to fly," regardless of the ultimate
consequences. Yes, Mr. Magorium actually
made me hate whimsy and wonder. No small feat.
It isn't an encouraging sign that when Bateman finally
busts loose from the buttoned-down prison of self and embraces his inner child
by donning a jester's cap and speaking in a silly voice, I felt betrayed
instead of delighted. Emporium makes
such a terrible case for delight that in the battle between life-loving pixies
and cold, dreary, soulless authority figures, I came down firmly on the side of
the authority figures. The last time I felt so oppressed by childhood innocence,
Roberto Benigni was threatening to makea love to humanity's face onna da moon during
the 1999 Academy Awards.
After Hoffman announces that he's intent on shucking off
his mortal coil as quickly as possible, Portman treats him to the most
splendiferous, excitementastical last day on earth ever. Why, they do a merry
little jig together (on top of bubble wrap, even! How crazy!), jump up and down
on a bed, and make a public phone call! Gosh, if Natalie Portman were intent on
making my last 24 hours on Earth as enjoyable as possible, there'd be a lot
less bubble-wrap jigs. But that's just me. I'm
probably alone in that respect.
Whimsy is a tricky thing. Get the tone wrong, and a
delightful concoction turns into a pounding ice-cream headache. Mr. Magorium nakedly aspires for a place in the pantheon of great
children's films. Instead, Helm has made a 2007 version of Toys.
How much of the experience wasn't a total waste of
time? 23 percent, and that's almost
exclusively due to Bateman's wry gravity and Portman's adorableosity. At the
risk of overstatement, I did not care for this film.