Reviews

Probably one of the best family movies I've ever seen. Lots of good clean fun, maybe a little bit scary for the youngest viewers, but not too scary for school age (I think). I intend to recommend it to my sister for her kids. I'm a big fan of Chris Van Allsburg's books. I enjoyed Polar Express a lot, but I loved Zathura. Definitely the best movie from his books to date. Almost as interesting as the movie itself was the making of the movie information from the DVD. I thought Josh was adorable, particularly how much he loved his stunts. I heartily recommend this movie. I watched it on a loan, now it's on my wish-list. Definitely a keeper for me!

I love Dick Francis novels, so I was glad to see them coming out in movies, until I saw the movies. (I've seen Blood Sport and In the Frame) I think the movies have lost the depth and uniqueness of the novels. Part of the problem is that they wanted to keep the same character in multiple stories, so they needed a more generic character. I think also, they were trying to make something that would fit into the television time frame, so they had to simplify. Unfortunately, when they simplified, they tossed out important characters that helped make the stories great. And changing the location of In the Frame from Australia to Germany didn't help either. I would not recommend the movies. Read the books instead.