movie review
Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium
Low-Key Fantasy Good For All Ages
Mr. Edward Magorium (a lispy, wild-haired Dustin Hoffman) is an eccentric 243-year-old owner of a fantastic toy store called the Wonder Emporium. It’s fantastic because all the toys come to life, including playful dinosaur skeletons, a fire-breathing dragon, and a mobile with real-live fish. Even the store itself has a mind of its own, with walls that breathe and rooms that can be programmed for different types of play.
Managing the store is Molly Mahoney (Natalie Portman – so tiny she must shop in the children’s department), a loner type who dreams of being a composer. She spends her days mentally composing and using the hand-rails on the train to tap out chord patterns. But she’s not convinced of her musical abilities and thus drowns in self-doubt.
Mr. Magorium has a plan. He’s planning to die, and thus wants to give the store to Molly. She’s none too happy with that idea and can’t imagine the store without him. Still, he calls in a stuffy accountant (Jason Bateman) to work over the books (stacks of papers in the store’s office), so he can leave the store in good financial health. It hardly seems likely, since Mr. Magorium has no business sense at all. But he’s tops with toys and has a child-like mind that puts everything into perspective.
The accountant – whom Mr. Magorium playfully calls “mutant” – can’t see the liveliness of the toys, so apparently, it’s only visible to believers. This is never really explained, but customers who can see the live fish and dragons don’t seem shocked at all. Especially a misfit kid named Eric (Zach Mills), who has no human friends and thus fits right in at the store.
This movie is colorful and fun, and handles heavy topics like death and loneliness with a thoughtful script. When the store learns that Mr. Magorium is leaving, it throws a temper tantrum and eventually shuts down, draining all the color out of the toys and turning everything to a depressing grey. But it leaves things open for a happy ending.
Appropriate for all ages, impressionable kids might feel sad about the death and loneliness in the storyline. But these heavy topics are handled respectfully—in a way that little ones might find easy to comprehend. It also opens the door for parent-child discussions.
As a grown-up dealing with mortgage payments and heating bills, it’s hard not to think about the questions in this movie: Why hasn’t the store been shut down, since it has no permits and has never paid taxes? Why is no one shocked to see live fish swimming in a mobile above their head? And when a real squid jumps out of a book and lands on a woman’s head, why isn’t she screaming and running around like a lunatic?
I think this is one of those low-key movies you have to just let wash over you, like a slide at a water park. Don’t think too much about it. Just enjoy.
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