Paddington 2 (2018)

Paddington 2 is the sequel that inevitably came from the success of the first. Paddington wants to get his Aunt a birthday present only to have it stolen and a case of mistaken identity ensues.

Paul King attempts to capture the lightning in the bottle that was the first Paddington. It's hard to do sequels and have them live up to the original, statically it's doomed to fail. This one was directed fine, nothing special, but the writing and screenplay were all over the place with subplots and in so the film suffers.

Ben Whishaw returns to voice Paddington. You might recognize him as Q from the bond film Spectre. His voice matches Paddington perfectly just as in the original. I look forward to seeing him in Mary Poppins Returns.

Sally Hawkins reprises her role as well and generally looks to be authentic in the film. Her smile always seems genuine. She was great in The Shape of Water, so maybe that's just swaying my review a bit. Little known fact about Sally Hawkins was that she was an extra in Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace.

Hugh Grant is the main antagonist of the film, and it's supposed to be a secret from the children who watch but it's easily noticed by an adult. His acting is subpar and seems to be phoning it in.

This film was nominated for a BAFTA, which leads me to believe that there's either a) not enough British movies to give out awards, or b) they've lowered their standards.

Result: C+ (A kids movie that kids probably won't enjoy, none of my children wanted to watch it 0, 3, and 6. The oldest said it was a grown-up movie)

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