64% on Rotten Tomatoes
Chloe's thoughts: It's alright
Watch it if you: Are a fan of Domnhall Gleeson;
Are interested in the relationship between the real Christopher Robin and his parents
Goodbye Christopher Robin tells the story of how A. A. Milne's creation (and the following success) of the Winnie the Pooh novels impacted his relationship with his son, the real life Christopher Robin.
I wasn't a huge fan of Winnie the Pooh when I was a kid (I mean, I did watch the cartoon but I never went crazy for them), so I wasn't too interested in this movie, but it was getting alright reviews and it had a good lead cast. I went in thinking I might get really bored and it might be a movie just for old people, but it was surprisingly entertaining. It's not the most entertaining story out there, and definitely not a movie for everyone, but I certainly wasn't bored and was even a little surprised at how engaged I was in the movie.
So since the cast is what sold me on this, let's talk about that since there's not much else to talk about. Domnhall Gleeson, who I love, stars as the post-war-traumatised A.A. Milne, while Margot Robbie stars as his commanding wife.
I really loved Domnhall Gleeson acting as Milne, and Margot Robbie did a great job at making the audience absolutely repulse her. I'm not too sure exactly what these people were like in real life, but their relationship with their son Christopher Robin was very strained, and you can definitely see and feel that in this movie.
Gleeson plays the distant father who kinda-sorta wants to connect with his son. He spends a lot of his time writing (or trying to), and so he ignores his son a lot, but the times that he does spend with his son, you can tell that he was trying his darndest to occupy and engage with him. On the other hand though, Margot Robbie's character thinks that literally just giving birth gives her the right to be a mother, and she doesn't actually put any effort into her relationship with her son. In between this and I, Tonya (2017), Margot Robbie is really making a name for herself with her diverse acting roles.
Speaking of, young Christopher Robin is played by Will Tilston, and Alex Lawther plays him grown up. It's been a great few years for child actors, since Will Tilston did a really good job! He was really cute, with his chubby face and huge dimples, and it didn't help that Mrs. Milne thought it best to dress up her little boy in girls' smocks...
Alex Lawther was also a pleasant surprise to see, as he was in the Shut Up and Dance episode of Black Mirror (2016) which he did a fantastic job in. His role in this is very small, and I hope to see him in bigger and better things.
Then the very Scottish Kelly Macdonald plays Christopher Robin's nanny, which makes her the third Black Mirror cast member here, so it was like a little fun reunion! I really loved her character, I felt so sorry for her because you could tell how much she loved Christopher Robin and how much she cared and looked out for him, especially when she had to witness his parents fighting all the time, and his eventual success after the Winnie the Pooh novels were published. She was Christopher Robin's true mother, since she always played and raised him, and since his real mother (Margot Robbie's character) was never emotionally around for him. Macdonald did a fantastic job here.
So the acting was really good, and I think that was the main thing that kept me engaged. The story was interesting and I don't remember ever getting bored, but I do recognise that it could be slow for some people and therefore it's not really a movie for everyone. It's also not a super memorable movie, but it's engaging in the moment. I'm quite interested in movies based on real people and real events, because I think that even if it was really dramatised and overly-Hollywoodised, it still happened to actual people, and so it's interesting to see that. I think it's also really interesting to see how the story of Winnie the Pooh was developed, just from A.A. Milne seeing how his son played with his toys. And to see how the stories became successful and sort of destroyed Christopher Robin's childhood was so fascinating because I never realised that at all. I don't know if I can see the cartoons the same way anymore.
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