Pete's dragging
Walt Disney Studios in case you haven't noticed has been remaking its movies with mostly dire results. There was the live-action The Jungle Book (which digitally rendered India a uniform gruel gray); the live-action Malificent (which totally bypassed the splendor of the original--possibly the only Disney animated feature I really liked--in favor of a puny little girl-power parable) and I hear that Kenneth Brannagh did a live-action
Cinderella (which I missed, thankfully; there's only so much punishment a critic can take).
The 1977 Pete's Dragon wasn't exactly a Disney classic come to life--it's not as funny as Jungle Book, does not feature cute rats like Cinderella, does not frighten you with a ten story high walking nightmare clad in clashing nightblack armor, bristling sable steel pikes a la Sleeping Beauty. There's room for improvement in the original, an entire apartment building's worth, tantalizingly promised by the opening sequence
--man woman and child driving through forest road, reading a children's book (Elliot Gets Lost) and discussing adventure. "
That's the other thing about adventures,"
declares Pete's dad; "
you got to be brave." At which point of course the deer hits the fan.
