Finding Neverland
Finding Neverland is a
2004 film, starring
Johnny Depp and
Kate Winslet. It is a semi-fictional account of the experiences of
Peter Pan author
J. M. Barrie that led him to write the children's classic. In the movie, he befriends a young widow - and more importantly, her four sons - and their experiences together give him the ideas for a story about boys who do not want to grow up.
Taglines: *
Unlock your imagination.*
How far can your imagination take you?*
Where will your imagination take you?The film is directed by
Marc Forster, who previously was responsible for
Monster's Ball; the screenplay was adapted by
David Magee from the play
The Man Who Was Peter Pan by
Allan Knee. It features a song written by
Elton John.
Dustin Hoffman,
Julie Christie and
Radha Mitchell also appear in the movie.
Finding Neverland was nominated for seven
Academy Awards, including
Best Adapted Screenplay,
Best Picture and
Best Actor for Johnny Depp. It won the Academy Award for
Best Original Score by
Jan A. P. Kaczmarek. It was also nominated for several other awards, including a
Screen Actors' Guild Award for
Freddie Highmore for playing the part of "Peter".
US Gross Domestic Takings:
US$ 51,680,613
+ Other International Takings: $64,970,000 = Gross Worldwide Takings: $116,650,613
Finding Neverland was originally scheduled to be released in the fall of 2003, but
Columbia Pictures, which had the rights to Barrie's play for their film
Peter Pan, refused to allow
Miramax to use certain scenes from the play in
Finding Neverland if it were to be released at the same time. Miramax thus agreed to delay the release of
Finding Neverland by one year in exchange for the rights to use Barrie's words.
*The film was at one point (before release) called
J.M. Barrie's Neverland.
*The film also featured a
Landseer dog as Barrie's pet, similar to the Newfoundland dog in the original Peter Pan story.
*Freddie Highmore and Johnny Depp are also in
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory together with Highmore playing Charlie and Depp playing Willy Wonka. This came about because Depp was extremely impressed with young Freddie's performance in this movie and requested him for the role of Charlie to
Tim Burton.
*
Dustin Hoffman, who appears in the movie, has also appeared in another famous work adapting the
Peter Pan mythos:
Hook, as the title character Captain James T. Hook.
*There was originally a scene in which Dustin Hoffman's character was to put on the Hook costume and read some of his lines to point out how silly he found it, but Hoffman didn't want to do it so the scene was changed to him reading off character names from the play.
*Consistently on
IMDb's
http://us.imdb.com/chart/top Top 250 list.
*Mary tells James that, although he stayed at home most of the time, he constantly seemed lost in himself. A similar accusation is made against another of
Johnny Depp's characters in
Secret Window.
In reality:
*There were five boys instead of four.
*
Arthur Llewellyn-Davies was still alive when Barrie met
Sylvia and her sons.
*Sylvia died in 1910, six years after the Peter Pan play was premiered (1904).
*The film's vaguely happy ending insinuated that life would be good for the new Barrie/Llewellyn-Davies clan. In actuality, the lives of the family members were rife with tragedy, and
Peter grew to resent
J.M. Barrie for his newfound fame.
*
Official Site
