Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events

—Overview
—Review by Kevin Miller
—Trailers, Photos
—Spiritual Connections

The makers of “Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events� showed particular insight in releasing the film during the Christmas season. Not because it’s time for “Christmas to take a holiday,� as the trailer for the film suggests. But because, for Americans familiar with the Dickensian feel behind seasonal favorites like A Christmas Carol, an adaptation of this series highlights, with humor, the dark underside of our society.

The film, and the series of children’s books on which it is based, begins with the three Baudelaire children learning they have become orphans. An unexplained fire has destroyed their home and parents, leaving them with a vast fortune. A heartless banker Mr. Poe (Timothy Spall) is charged with placing these wards with their closest relative. Instead of getting care from a loving family member, the orphans are placed with the diabolical Count Olaf (Jim Carrey), a geographically proximate but emotionally distant relative who is determined to make off with the Baudelaire fortune.

The dark nature of this story is aptly depicted in the film’s visual look and costumes – something that members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences recognized in nominating the film for best art direction and best costume design. The musical score, the film’s third Oscar nomination, also helps set the tone for the story.

The 1-hour and 47-minute film draws from the first three books in what will eventually be a 13-book series: “The Bad Beginning,� “The Reptile Room� and “The Wide Window.� The books are penned by the enigmatic Lemony Snicket (alias Daniel Handler), whose voice is represented in the film by actor Jude Law.

The film does an admirable job of bringing the spirit of the first three books to the screen, even if it awkwardly juggles the sequences a bit to make the dramatic plot of the first book the climactic focus of the film.

Count Olaf, an inept and unemployed actor, through conniving continually dons different disguises in his efforts to steal the Baudelaire fortune. The role seems tailor-made for Carrey. And while he manages to capture some of the silliness of the book, many of his ad-libs are over the top, although not enough to mar a good film.

By contrast, the characterizations of the children are excellent. We quickly understand that when Violet (Emily Browning) ties her hair up, she’s cooking up a mechanical invention, that Klaus (Liam Aiken) photographically remembers what he reads in books, and that the toddler Sunny (Kara and Shelby Hoffman) excels in biting things. Often literary techniques suffer in the translation to film, but the filmmakers here do an excellent job of translating Sunny’s gibberish, understood by the other Baudelaire orphans and explained at length in the novels, through use of subtitles. Sunny’s lines are a scream! -- so much so that actress Meryl Streep (who plays one of the children’s aunt Josephine) described the twins as scene-stealers. Some of their lines do push the boundary of good taste, although the film’s PG rating is primarily for scary situations and brief language.

Some faith-based reviewers are scared off by the books’ light-hearted darkness and have predictably warned that the film teaches children the world is an evil place where adults can’t be trusted. These literalists fail to see that the film, and the series that inspired it, in broad strokes offer a spiritual metaphor for our contemporary society. The basic thrust of the series is that the adults charged with the care of children are either so ill-equipped to protect and care for those children or too self-possessed to bother. While there are many exceptions (represented in this film by Billy Connolly’s fine portrayal of Uncle Monty), that theme has particular poignancy today.

Childhood was never “insulated from the pressures and demands of the surrounding society,� according to a new book, “Huck’s Raft: A History of American Childhood� by Steven Mintz (Harvard University Press). America’s children today, if they are brought into this world and survive unscathed till adulthood, are poised to inherit an unprecedented mountain of federal debt run up, in part, because the wealthiest adults are gorging themselves on the public trough. The disguises of our real-life villains aren’t as obvious as those of Count Olaf.

It has been said that a society is best judged by how it treats its most vulnerable members, particularly its children. The cinematic treatment of the Baudelaire children would seem too outlandish, if it weren’t for the daily news reports that continue to shock us about the abuse of children. Many of our classic fairy tales contain a dark side, which becomes truly evident through a mature reading of the tales. Perhaps this film’s box office success indicates that our society recognizes Lemony Snicket as one of this season’s most fortunate film events for children, families and young adults.

—Overview
—Review by Kevin Miller
—Trailers, Photos
—Spiritual Connections