A Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood Review

Now then film fans before I start of this review I want to let you all know that i've never seen an  single episode of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood just due to the fact that here in the UK we never got it. Like alot of people I was excited for this film because it looked so honest and so powerful so much so that I was eagerly awaiting it's release and so then ladies and gents here is my review of A Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood.

The plot of the movie is writer Lloyd Vogel is assigned to interview Fred Rogers and has to turn a four hundred word article about heroes. That's all i'm going to say because it truly is worth seeing just for the story alone and from what I could gather just by the trailers and Wikipedia this film really does feel like a feature length episode of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood that's how honest and real the story is in my opinion.

Starring in the film is Tom Hanks as Fred Rogers , Matthew Rhys as Lloyd Vogel , Susan Kelechi Watson as Andrea Vogel , Chris Cooper as Jerry Vogel , Enrico Colantoni as Bill Isler , Maryann Plunkett as Joanne Rogers , Tammy Blanchard as Lorraine , Wendy Makkena as Dorothy , Carmen Cusack as Margy , Jessica Hecht as Lila Vogel , Noah Harpster as Todd , Maddie Corman as Betty Aberlin.

Ok no matter if there's anything negative to say about the film coming from any reviewer they can all agree that Tom hanks is freaking perfect as Fred Rogers he brings alot of warmth  and kindness to the role and while I have no idea if that was true for the real Fred i'm glad it was in this film. It's not all good tho for the rest of the cast as I did find the acting overall to be really mixed and alot of them are outshined by Tom Hanks.

This is loosely based on the article "Can You Say... Hero?" by Tom Junod which was published in Esquire in 1998. When I say it's loosely based on the article I mean very loosely based on it because of the fact that the main character isn't called Tom he's called Lloyd and from what I can gather nothing that's mentioned in the actual article (yes I have pulled it up online) happens in the movie.

The best thing I can say about this film is that it's nice it's a nice film to go and see with the family and just have a good time watching it. In this case that is a great thing because again just based of what i've read it's true to the person of Fred Rogers and so to do anything that's other then nice would be a disservice not only to him but also to his legacy and for a person like this is really something that you cannot do.

Now the company releasing this film did is what in my opinion a very stupid thing and that's the fact that they chose to release this film the exact same day as 21 Bridges and what is clearly going to be the big winner this weekend Frozen 2. By releasing it on the same day as these two big hitting films your giving a film that already has an uphill battle an even bigger mountain to over come I just don't get why they couldn't have released this film a few weeks later so then that way there's a lot of breathing room between big releases.

It's due to the fact that this film was released the exact same day as Frozen 2 that I had a tough choice to make which was do I cover this film first or Frozen 2. Now depending on where your seeing this review you'll know exactly which I chose to cover first and while I do stick by that choice I will say that you should go and see this film rather then Frozen 2 since while Frozen 2 is the better film you and your kids won't be better of for seeing it where as you will be better of for seeing this film.

This is a drama and it will shock you to learn that there isn't that much actual drama in the whole film in fact there's only one bit of drama which forms a subplot and that's it. I have to say that it's honestly refreshing for me to see a drama that's light on the drama just because I see alot of drama where they lay on the drama thick and heavy where as here it's not really needed and i'm glad since I feel that it would have hurt the film if there was alot of drama in every single scene.

Now all i've seen in Mister Rogers is just from Google Images and I can say that the film does a really good job of recreating the Mister Rogers set. Almost to the point where it looks like they went into a time machine and stole the one used from the actual show I assume that everyone involved with the making of the film was a huge fan because to go that amount of detail is just crazy to me since they could have just made up a new Mister Rogers house from scratch.

This is the third film from newcomer Marielle Heller and I can say that just based of this film she is one to keep an eye on. From what I can gather just from this film she really does know how to make a great film since it currently has a rating of 96% on RT and for someone who's only made three films to not only get that score but also get the cast that this film has to me says she has some real talent and will make great films in the future.

Overall if you haven't seen it yet go and see this movie right now infact don't even click on this review just go and see the movie. While this movie does indeed have it's faults one of which i've mentioned all of the others contain spoilers and thus won't be covered here the film does deserve any praise that it gets and I do believe that out of the two film Frozen 2 is better overall and so this film gets an 8 out of 10 from me.