Product description

Mirrormask [DVD] [2005]

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Average customer rating: 3.5

Binding : DVD
EAN : 5035822384637
Label : Sony Pictures Home Ent. UK
Manufacturer : Sony Pictures Home Ent. UK
Publisher : Sony Pictures Home Ent. UK
Release date : 2006-06-05
Title : Mirrormask [DVD] [2005]
Actor : Array
Audience rating : Parental Guidance
Format : Array
Languages : Array
Number of items : 1
Original release date : 2005-01-01
Region code : 2
Running time : 97
Studio : Sony Pictures Home Ent. UK
Theatrical releaseDate : 2005

Editorial reviews

Amazon.co.uk Review
This visually stunning film is the product of a collaboration of award-winning graphic novelist Neil Gaiman (creator of the much-lauded ISandman/I series), his frequent collaborator Dave McKean (ICages/I), and The Jim Henson Company, themselves no strangers to elaborate fantasies such as IThe Dark Crystal/I. and ILabyrinth/I. As with the latter film, IMirrorMask/I focuses on a young woman unhappy with her daily existence; here, the artistically inclined Helena (Stephanie Leonides), is at odds with her circus performer parents. When a careless insult appears to send her mother (Gina McKee) into a coma, Helena withdraws into the dark and elaborate world of her drawings, in which a scenario very similar to her predicament in the real world is unfolding. Gaiman and director McKean create arresting images to populate Helena's world, and the Henson Company brings them vividly to life with CGI; though the story is occasionally murky, the fantasy elements are imaginative enough to enthral what will undoubtedly be the film's toughest customers--younger viewers. --IPaul Gaita/I

Customer reviews

review by: Looby Lou. date: 2009-03-25 rating:

Complete rubbish
Being an ardent fan of Labyrinth, which this film has been compared to- I was expecting a modern interpretation with something new and exciting put into the mix. The music running throughout is irritating and even though the cast is decent enough, I switched off after half an hour. Thoroughly disapointed and bored. The script lacked depth and there was too much CGI.The magic of what fantasy classics such as Legend, Never ending story and Labyrinth had just wasnt in this. A waste of my money.

review by: date: 2008-11-25 rating:

Dreamlike, surreal, amazing, unique....
...are probably the words that could best describe Mirrormask. It's an astonishing looking film, probably a little too bizarre for some people but if you like anything that's a bit strange, unusual and fantastical than you should find plenty to like here. The visuals are amazing, and the film achieves the rare feat of capturing the look and feel of a particularly strange dream you might have had. It's perhaps a little slow in places and the storyline might be a bit too simplistic, but it's the atmosphere and look of the film that is it's main strength and I can honestly say I've not seen another film that even remotley resembles Mirrormask - it's unique and unique films are a rarity to be treasured. Highly recommended, but it's a film that viewers will either love or hate. I love it.

review by: date: 2008-09-25 rating:

Unwatchable
Well, I managed about 30 minutes and then had to turn it off. A fairytale with no magic, visuals with no sense of wonder, murky and multi layered sfx, leadenly scripted and so uninvolving it leaves one bewildered. Even worse is that the visual language and pace of the film adamantly refuses you access in an attempt to be different and radical. The berserk music score also annoys. On the plus side the female lead is very good, but then so what? Quite possibly one of the worst films ever made. Zero stars.

review by: date: 2008-06-11 rating:

Arty and boring British film
I don't mind arty films if there's decent writing too..but this film was just producation design and creative CGI. Very original looking, but not enough to hold your attention past half an hour, which is when I gave up. I think art and film students would get something from it, but that's it. br /Disappointed.

review by: date: 2008-04-20 rating:

Intriguing If Too Abstract
Having watched Stardust and finding it okay, I found that one of my suitemates had left his copy of Mirrormask in the dormitory for spring break. br / br /Being a newcomer to Gaiman/McKean, I watched the extras of the DVD before watching the actual feature. So I was aware that the film had a limited budget and was very much an "independent" film. br / br /Knowing that, the film still did not start off very promising. Tensions ensue between Helena and her mother Joanna, both members of a family-owned circus. Helena and Joanna quarrel--Helena being tired of circus life--and the row ends with Helena essentially having told her mother to die. Unfortunately, Joanna suffers an attack of sorts during the circus performance and is rushed to hospital. On top of this, Helena's father is under financial strain with regard to the circus; and the family live in a dingy flat in Brighton. With no boyfriend or any real friends (apart from her fellow circus performers) Helena's outlet is drawing (all McKean's work). Her room is papered with drawings of a city, and even the dingy terrace of the flat is decorated with many of her sketched windows and suns. br / br /One night, Helena's sleep is disturbed when she hears a violin. Leaving the flat, she follows the sound to two men in masks playing a violin. Suddenly, a sort of CGI gangrene starts swallowing up the architecture. Helena escapes with one of the masked men, Valentine, through a door. From then on, everything is done is a very stylized CGI. br / br /Essentially, Helena has ended up in a world that resembles her drawings. Whenever she looks through one of the windows in the imaginary world, she can see into her bedroom, where there is another darker version of herself supposedly wreaking havoc. This other Helena is the Shadow Princess, who resembles Helena in the alternate world, which explains why Helena is constantly being mistaken for her. The crisis of the drawing world is that the Shadow Queen is desperate to reclaim her daughter and so encroaches with her shadow upon the other side of this world which is pure light. The problem, however, is that the Queen of Light is in a deep sleep and so can't defend the city. Therefore, Helena volunteers to track down the MirrorMask, which will supposedly restore everything to normal. br / br /Yeah. It sounds dense but it's actually very simple. The light/dark dichotomy is fairly obvious as Helena has been usurped by her doppelganger and must find the MirrorMask to restore the balance. br / br /I'd say that the simplicity of the story is the film's weakness. It feels like Gaiman pulled down a Literary Theory textbook and found Lacan's work on the mirror stage of development and Freud's work on the uncanny and crossed them with Alice in Wonderland and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Not that I don't like Alice or Dr.J.Mr.H., but the film runs primarily on inconsistent and inexplicable dream logic; and the ending is rather open-ended as to whether or not it is a dream. Which is fine if you don't require closure. br / br /That being said, I felt the film picked up quite a bit when Helena officially meets the Shadow Queen and undergoes that eerily seductive transformation when the wind-up ballerinas sing "Why Do Birds Suddenly Appear?" br / br /It's certainly a weird film, but it's worth the viewing. I can't praise the film as a whole, but there certainly is a lot to like here.

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