Inkheart

I managed to watch Inkheart yesterday. Sometime back, I posted the trailer for the movie on my blog, which included a scene that included Toto. Yes, Toto.

The movie is based on the novel of the same name by Cornelia Funke. It revolves around a family of silvertongues, who make things and people appear from books they read aloud. Father Mo and his daughter Meggie are looking for a copy of Inkheart, a book they had an unfortunate encounter with sometime back, which led to their wife and mother's disappearance. Apparently, when something comes out of a book, something goes in. However, the villain of the book, Capricorn, is finding and destroying all copies of the book to ensure he can never return.

What does this have to do with Oz? I've heard that this wasn't in the book, but one book that features prominently is The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. While escaping from Capricorn, Mo, Meggie and some friends (some fictional) use the cyclone from the book to distract everyone. Later, Meggie summons Toto, and the Winged Monkeys can be seen in Capricorn's prison. I liked the way the characters looked, but was didn't enjoy seeing their take on Kansas from the book. We see a road and telephone poles outside of where the house was, and a farmer (presumably Uncle Henry) just sitting there. The house seemed very distant in the book, and telephone poles wouldn't be around in 1900.

However, I thought the movie managed to tell an interesting story, and told it very well. The acting was great (at least, so it seemed on the first view), and the special effects and music were done very well and weren't overwhelming.

And overall, I thought it was a good, family-friendly, pro-literacy (yep!) movie. We need more of those...