This ‘Island’ should get lost

Ordinarily, children’s movies adapted from books do pretty well; unfortunately, “Nim’s Island” is a notable exception. It falls flat on its face, in spite of the considerable star power crammed into it. Things that would have been wonderful and magical in the book didn’t transfer well, with inconsistent pacing and a confusing overall tone.

The nominal plot concerns a girl named Nim (Abigail Breslin) who lives on a private, undiscovered volcanic island with her father Jack (Gerard Butler). Her father leaves the island on a two-day scientific voyage to gather nanoplankton from the ocean, leaving Nim alone with her animal friends. When Jack gets caught in a storm and doesn’t come back, Nim e-mails the hero of her favorite adventure books, the Indiana Jones-esque Alex Rover (also played by Butler).

Alex Rover, in the film’s central twist, is only a figment in the imagination of Alexandra Rover (Jodie Foster), an agoraphobic writer who hasn’t left her apartment in months. After convincing the author to come to a remote South Pacific island, the little girl climbs a volcano, starts an eruption and fights off a band of invading cruise ship tourists who she mistakes for pirates. All of this sounds like the ingredients of a promising film, but the final product ends up feeling disjointed and boring.

A “cute” movie for the 10-and-under crowd, “Nim’s Island” fails to hold up to the scrutiny of an older audience. The plot is weak, the dialogue weaker. Like watching an episode of “Barney,” half the movie is spent with the characters continuously describing everything they think, see or feel.

The animals in the movie give the best performance, upstaging poor performances by their supposedly talented human co-stars and managing to salvage a film that otherwise would have sunk. Who knew a sea-lion that plays soccer and hordes of lizards flying through the air could be so cute?

“Nim’s Island” fails to deliver on the promise of what could have been a great family movie. While it has its moments, the overall movie drags until even the 8–year-olds in the theater start asking “Is it over yet? I need to go to the bathroom.”

The audience has spoken.