Title – A Wrinkle in Time (2018)

Director – Ava DuVernay (Selma)

Cast – Storm Reid, Levi Miller, Deric McCabe, Reese Witherspoon, Oprah Winfrey, Mindy Kaling, Chris Pine, Gugu Mbatha-Raw

Plot – Three otherworldly beings send Meg (Reid), her brother Charles Wallace (McCabe) and friend Calvin (Miller) on a universe spanning quest to find Meg’s lost scientist father Mr. Murray (Pine).

“What if we are here for a reason. What if we are part of something truly divine”

Review by Eddie on 26/11/2018

I’ve seen some real stinkers in my life as a movie fan but few duds would compare to the irredeemable mess that is A Wrinkle in Time.

A highly promoted and touted property from the behemoth that is the house of Disney, that had the added benefit of being an adaptation of Madeleine L’Engle’s much-loved book (thought unadaptable for the big screen and on the basis of this film, for valid reasons), A Wrinkle in Time is one of the biggest failures of recent times for the world conquering production studio in terms of both public reception and box-office figures.

Directed by Selma filmmaker Ava DuVernay, Wrinkle does mark the first time a female directed feature has grossed $100 million dollars at the American box-office but outside of this noteworthy occurrence, DuVernay struggles to maintain any form of coherence in Wrinkle as the cheesy, trite and downright not right sci-fi and fantasy infused tale of Storm Reid’s young girl Meg on a universe spanning quest to find her lost father is an adventure that is definitely not worth taking.

From the film’s opening moments there’s a sense that this jumbled mess of ideas and forced sentimentality is setting itself up for failure and while you hope that things will get better, they don’t, with Wrinkle marking down an embarrassing career lowlight for the high profile participants involved.

How well-regarded actors such as Reese Witherspoon, Oprah Winfrey, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Michael Pena and Chris Pine or recognisable public figures such as Zach Galifianakis or Mindy Kaling thought it was a good idea signing on for this film after reading Jennifer Lee and Jeff Stockwell’s badly formed script is beyond me, with all their appearances in DuVernay’s film both humiliating and degrading as the performers struggle to bring L’Engle’s original tales to life under the guise of over the top make-up and through cheese worthy lines of dialogue.

You feel sorry for these capable performers with the films youngest cast members Reid, Levi Miller and Deric McCabe also failing to overcome the core problems that stem from the films very conception with blame having to fall largely at DuVernay’s feet, in what marks a worryingly bad moment in the filmmakers career after the success of Selma and the well-received documentary The 13th with Wrinkle feeling like a project that the director got lost in and in many ways in over her head, as she struggles to maintain any form of direction in a collection of colourful scenes that mean and matter very little to the overall scheme of things.

Final Say –

It’s hard to find anything worth recommending in such a fundamentally bad film, filled with atrocious dialogue, terrible editing and a general sense of aimlessness, A Wrinkle in Time may mean well but it doesn’t make the experience any more bearable, as we are forced to endure almost 2 hours’ worth of schmaltz and underserved preaching. A genuine turkey, this is the film to beat when it comes to the title of worst film of 2018.

½ a giant Oprah out of 5