Die Geheimnisse der Spiderwicks

The first half is very entertaining and the pace Mark Waters sets by the time the protagonists get to town is almost lethal. By the end, however, the script runs out of breath and not even the decent actors, the good music and the above-average direction can save it. (19.03.2008)

To tell you the truth, during the first twenty minutes, Mark Waters absolutely disarmed me and I’m not scared to admit that he even almost enthused me. Everything worked better than I had expected. Primarily the atmosphere and the aura of a kids’ journey to find adventure oozes from it. The kids here aren’t nearly so bad as they tend to be in similar types of movies, but they are nicely naughty and believable buggers who won’t leave some poor souls to read in peace. I just love these kids. And to add to the goodness, here the movie has rather a dark feeling about it. And after rather a mysterious opening they pull out their trump card: CGI dwarves. After this, the Chronicles stops all pretense and... the cruel truth emerges. No miracles happen, this is just another in that endless cycle of sprouting attractive family fantasies with no head or tail, designed for disposal. There is no story, just a substitute for a story in the form of a functionless pastiche with no end of clichés. And, what is worse, they are bad and terribly naive clichés at that. But not naive in a cute, fairytale way, but in precisely the opposite way. And, to make things worse, we get forced a handful of moralizing. Or rather a whole wagon load of moralizing. In terms of acting, this is like the woodpile before the winter. Wood stacked up, listlessly sitting there. Even Nick Nolte, in his only (very short) scene, manages to embarrass himself more than he has done in many a year. Not to speak of the usually otherwise outstanding Strathairn. As a whole it isn’t absolutely bad, and not even very boring; in technical terms it’s well-made, but he managed very easily to annoy me more than anything has for a long while. Which is a shame, because the beginning promised great things in terms of quality and Freddie Highmore does an unexpectedly good job with his double role. That kid’s got something in him. And that is the only information that the Chronicles gave me. But I knew that a long time ago, anyway, so in fact it was a completely needless watch. (17.06.2008)

I don't know why, but I couldn't tear myself away from the movie. I was expecting another unsuccessful fantasy, and I was baffled by a good action horror movie. A great movie for all generations. (06.02.2011)

Ich hatte gehofft, dass die Spiderwicks für ein älteres Publikum ähnlich interessant sein würden wie Lemony Snicket - Rätselhafte Ereignisse oder eben die Chroniken von Narnia. Ich habe versucht, auch die Bücher zu lesen, aber obwohl sie so angenehm in der Hand liegen und so bezaubernd illustriert sind, sind sie wirklich eher für Kinder unter 10 Jahren geeignet. Und auch die Verfilmung ist nicht anders. Wenn Sie jedoch diese Altersgruppe um sich haben, brauchen Sie nicht zu zögern. Tony DiTerlizzi schrieb zusammen mit Holly Black insgesamt 8 Folgen (5 der Hauptreihe und 3 darüber, was danach kam). (28.07.2019)

This is a cute, adventurous, and likable movie with two young actors who give good performances, and an average story. Visually, the movie is really great (I was very pleasantly surprised at it considering it was made on a low budget) and the acting is also great (Freddie Highmore is impeccable in his dual role, Sarah Bolger is great opposite him), the rest is merely just-OK. In short, it is a solid enough movie worth watching once, that neither offends nor delights. (19.01.2009)

Another in a series of films that can be called fairy tale fantasy family stories. And once again Freddie Highmore, who shone mainly in the film "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", has recently been perhaps the only positive element of two sequels "Arthur and the Invisibles". "The Spiderwick Chronicles" is actually very similar to the film "Arthur and the Invisibles", which is a bit of a shame because it kind of brings the film down. The main hero, who is here twice because Freddie plays twins, again discovers something that is right next to our world but is quite different. The computer effects in this case are quite good, which adds to the fantasy feel. When elements from fairy tales appear, it's a nice film. But that's all it is, just a nice film that doesn't have much else to offer. More: http://www.filmovy-denik.cz/2012/06/past-na-zraloka-21-jump-street.html (20.02.2013)