Festive fantasy with bells on
JINGLE JANGLE: A CHRISTMAS JOURNEY
★★★★✩
‘ANYTHING Disney can do, we can do bigger!’ seems to be the ethos of this allsinging, all-dancing spectacular, so lavish that even by Netflix standards the very bells appear to have bells on.
’Tis the night before Christmas, when two adorable children beg their grandmother (Phylicia Rashad) for a bedtime tale. With a twinkle in her eye she opens a huge leather-bound fairy-tale book and declares: ‘It’s time for a new story.’
Welcome to a cobbled Victorian fantasy town actually called Cobbleton, notable for its lashings of fake snow and crinoline-heavy flash mobs. Here, legendary toymaker Jeronicus Jangle (Forest Whitaker) sees his fortunes crumble after his jealous assistant Gustafson (Keegan-Michael Key) steals his greatest new invention, a vain matador robot (voiced by Ricky Martin).
When further personal tragedy strikes, Jeronicus becomes a recluse, shunning his only daughter (Anika Noni Rose) until his granddaughter (Madalen Mills), an aspiring inventor herself, resolves to reunite the family and restore grandpa’s creative mojo.
What’s overridingly ‘new’ about the film is that the main cast – aside from
Hugh Bonneville, who pops up to splutter ‘by Jove!’ at intervals as the mutton-chopped bank manager – is entirely non-white. That makes this big-bucks festive musical something landmark in the history of cinema.
African-American writer/director David E Talbert grew up on Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory and, we’re guessing, Short Circuit, and was determined his own kids would see themselves represented in a similar wonderland. Like a kid in a candy story he’s overstuffed us with treats and the 122minute plot is more tangled than last year’s fairy lights. But who wants to be Scrooge-like about excess at Christmas?
You may not always get what Talbert’s gorgeously dressed characters are singing about but boy, do you feel it. Whitaker is an early call for a Golden Globe nomination – causing my nineyear-old to be moved to tears.
A big, warm-hearted celebration of patience, forgiveness, inclusivity, the power of family and believing in yourself and your dreams, Jingle Jangle could well become the new Chrimbo favourite Netflix are banking on. LARUSHKA IVAN-ZADEH