Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.

This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

This is one of the greatest movies I have ever seen. There were many parts that I did not understand but I still loved every moment of it. I have never read or even heard of the book. It seems that there are many different interpretations of this story. No matter which you choose, it is a poignant and delightful tale.First off you have to suspend disbelief a little bit. Obviously in the real world a little girl secretly spending time alone with her old neighbor would not be a good idea. But in this realm we know right off the bat that everything will be fine.I found it very interesting that not a single one of the characters has an actual name. I found myself not even realizing this until halfway through. The little girl's mother had already fully immersed her in the essential world of adults and she had no friends and was not permitted to be a child. I love how no matter how perfect and rigid the mother tries to be, there is always one tiny piece of hair sticking out of place against her forehead. I thought that this was very poetic. And in the end when she finally learns from her daughter, she is wearing casual clothes to show that she has calmed down. I also thought it was very sad and beautiful when the aviator left the mother an illustrated apology note and a rose to try to make amends for the damage he had done to their house. She read the note over and then immediately disposed of it as well as the rose as they were not "essential" to her. This is the mother tossing away his attempt to connect with her.I personally feel that The Little Prince represented The Aviator's inner child, I do not believe he was actually a separate entity at all. We see in the very beginning that The Aviator used to love to create drawings that no one understood. The very first thing The Little Prince asks the aviator to do when he crashes in the Sahara dessert is to draw him something. I think that the aviator's troubled mind upon waiting for rescue or death conjured the image of his former self to comfort him since he was all alone. The Little Prince asks the aviator to draw him a sheep which is often symbolic of being a conformist or "part of the herd." I believe that the little prince is killed by the snake in the dessert, or at least the idea of him is. The aviator's drawings in the beginning depicted creatures being swallowed whole by snakes and to me this seems like what happened to the little prince. But it was only a shell, and as the little prince said, "No one is sad over old shells." So the aviator fixes his plane and moves on, but never forgets the little prince.We see the dangers of growing up too fast and also of never growing up in this movie. It was very unhealthy for the little girl to be so involved in the adult world already, her mom talking to her at length about work problems and her being able to file police reports. It was also just as unhealthy for the aviator to still be acting like a child. He could have killed the little girl several times, particularly when they are both beholding a butterfly and he runs the stop sign. Most of the adults were depicted as villains, people who had entirely forgotten their former selves and who no longer possessed love or hope for anything or anyone. "Growing up is not the problem, forgetting is." The key is to grow up but to hold on to what is most essential, what cannot be seen with the eye, but with the heart instead.Even though this movie and book are dubbed a fantasy, I am fairly certain that everything that happened with the little girl taking the plane to find the little prince is just a result of the fall that she took. I do not think that the little prince was real, I think it is just the idea of him that is important. She imagined him lost on a planet of adults who had corrupted him and now she must save him and reawaken hope in his heart. It is important to her that Mr. Prince remembers who he is because she is so terrified that she will suffer the same fate, especially when the aviator leaves her. It was beautiful when he turned back into the little prince in the end and she was able to finish the aviator's story for him before his ended. I loved all of the symbolism in this movie and the all star cast. Paul Rudd's scene with the little girl in the end when the rose dies is particularly heart wrenching. James Franco also spoke very tenderly as the fox. Human connections are certainly what is most essential in this world.

Have you ever heard of the animated film "Ernest & Celestine"? You probably haven't and that's because it didn't receive a wide release. The film was made in France, starred the fine young actress Mackenzie Foy along with Forrest Whitaker, and focused on the friendship between a mouse named Celestine and a bear named Ernest. I loved the film from beginning to end and it was certainly a sweet animated movie. The reason I say this is because "The Little Prince" is another animated movie that is pretty similar. It was made in France, also starred Mackenzie Foy, focused on a friendship, and didn't get a wide release with the film being released on Netflix in the United States. When I saw that the film was selected for completion at the Cannes Film Festival in 2015 and critics praising the film calling it a beautiful masterpiece, I got interested. I watched the movie after the film was released to Netflix and I'm sad to say that I didn't really enjoy the movie because I couldn't get into this film.  I'll try to explain why because honestly it was really hard to follow this film.The film focuses on a young girl played by Mackenzie Foy. Her mother (Rachel McAdams) is trying to get her into this big academy and decides to prep her throughout the entire summer with a giant schedule telling her to read the schoolbooks and doing complex work. However, an old aviator (Jeff Bridges) gets her distracted and tells her stories about a young boy called The Little Prince (Riley Osborne) and how the aviator met him after crash landing in the Sahara Dessert . The girl then skips doing her daily assignments and goes to the old aviator every day and continues listening to the story about the Little Prince, not telling her mother.From what I just said, it doesn't sound bad at all, but trust me when I say the story is definitely the worst part about this movie.  Having never read the book it was based only by Antoine de Saint- Exupéry, I judged the film on it's own and honestly it started off decently, but then I got confused with the sections about The Little Prince and then about a third though the movie, I was totally lost. The movie just went spiraling out of control with no focus whatsoever and when the film ended I was left so baffled and confused. The characters didn't really leave much of an impact on me either. They're a couple of reasons for this. One is that they have no names. I mean none whatsoever. The movie just credits them as "The Aviator", "The Mother", or "The Little Girl" and that did get me a little frustrated because I find it lazy when a movie doesn't give characters names. The second problem with them is that, I didn't feel they had a clear personality. I mean, some I could understand like The Mother and The Little Girl, but characters like The Aviator and especially The Little Prince had very little to no personalities. As for the animation, I'm pretty split about. The stop motion elements of the movie I think are beautiful. It may not be as good as "Kubo and the Two Strings", but I thought it was pretty well done. They have a paper like feel to them and I definitely could see the craft in them. The computer animation parts, however, seemed amateur to me. I felt like they were done by an animation student and not by professionals which is a problem when you get down to it. I also really hated the cinematography in the film. Most of the shots were straight and didn't have tilts or were shot in different angles, they were just straight and that kind of became irritating  after a while. Now I will give the movie credit on this though. The voice acting is outstanding. I thought the characters were well casted and performed and they definitely brought something to the characters, but not a lot."The Little Prince" was just a confused mess. I could see something trying to get out of this film, but the story was just to confusing for me to grasp. I really was not impressed, which is a shame as I could see that this film really did try. However, I thought this film was trying to be a nice and sweet animated movie and it failed to accomplish. If you want much better animated movies that are nice and sweet, might I suggest watching the aforementioned"Ernest & Celestine" or even the director's previous work "Kung Fu Panda". Those movies had much more joy and balance than this film ever did, and besides they both got Oscar nominations anyway.

A lot of people are probably going to hate me for not giving this a perfect score but the thing is, I really did enjoy this film! I admit to being very unfamiliar with the original book version of "The Little Prince". I only know that it's one of the best selling books of all time. I hear some people regard this as a stop motion film, but most of it isn't that at all. I was kind of disappointed by that, because while the CGI was good, the stop motion was simply fantastic. The details were down so perfectly and the characters had more depth this way. I still like the idea of two styles being blended together.I also like the story a lot, particularly with how it deals with a little girl who has a mother who literally arranges everything in her life to happen at a specific time. Most of us know what it's like to live with someone who wants everything to be precise. I admit that the film does get weak in the last third, particularly with how it suddenly turns into a dystopian future-like world. I do like the reveal for the main villain. This is the first and probably only movie I'll ever see on my Netflix as my free trial is ending. I had no idea it was just a Netflix movie so boy am I glad I saw it there! ***

The Little Prince is an adaption of the classic children's tale, with a modern twist. The film follows a young girl who lives with her single mother. The pair are highly regimented, and trying hard to get the young girl into a prestigious private school. To do so, a strict regiment of studying is required, which books her entire summer. She has no issue with this, until the kooky old man next door fires a propeller through her back wall, and changes the young girls life. He introduces her to his story of a young prince and his travels (loosely, the Antoine de Saint-Exupéry tale), and she begins to flounder on her studies, and opens her imagination up to the wondrous tales of adventure offered, and begins to wonder if they are really real.This is a well told story with an interesting twist to it. The Little Prince is a classic tale, and one which has sparked the imaginations of children the world over (and did so for me as well). Making a film out of such a tale can be daunting. How to adapt it to modern audiences? How to get studio backing for the project? Should it be a faithful adaption, or should there be changes? This version of the story is well told, and revolves quite a bit around the meta-story more so than the actual Little Prince tale. It takes place after the events of the story. The Aviatar is an old man, the Little Prince grown up, the stars have changed. This is more a tale of unlocking the power of imagination, and remembering the childhood we all once had, and the amazing and creative things we did back then.The film is animated in two styles. The first, is the main story, and features a more "realistic" style animation akin to a modern Disney film. The second is a paper-mache style animation done for the retelling of the Little Prince. Both suit the story well, although I personally preferred the more magical and innovative animation style done for the Little Prince sections of the film, over the more realistic style.Story-wise, I was left feeling lukewarm. The innovative story was interesting and fun, and sure to be appealing to kids and watchable for adults. I particularly enjoyed the interesting fantasy elements, which felt pure and innocent. The story of the young girl fit well enough into the framework of the Little Prince, as she journey's to find out what has happened since the story ended. Even so, some bits of the story felt highly manufactured. It is disappointing in some respects that the filmmakers did not give more story time and credit to the original work, and sacrificed much to a bog-standard version of childhood innocence. The Little Prince itself would have made a fantastic film (or even television series), and it feels wasteful to give it so little screen time in relation to the story of the girl and her mother, and how they don't understand each other, and how the mother forgot her childhood and so on. I unfortunately found myself constantly feeling disappointed at the films storytelling, and although it was not awful or even bad, it did not due the old story justice, and does not hold enough magic itself to create a new tale for the ages. It just felt mediocre.The target audience for the film also felt muddled. The film will surely be too childish for fans of the source work (those coming at it from a nostalgic lens). The story was also too grey and serious in some places for younger kids. The world the young girl inhibits is grey and corporate. Her life is regimented by schedules, the stars are gone, and she has no time for fun and games. Much of the movie's run time takes place in this space, and it may turn out to be to dull children.The voice acting in the film also felt a tad wooden. Jeff Bridges as the Aviator was a good choice on paper. He has a distinctive voice, and has played wonderful roles in many of his recent films. Even so, he felt too wooden. The voice acting felt like an Anime English dub, with little emotion or backing from him. Mackenzie Foy, as the young girl, was much more interesting in most place, but still suffered some of the same restrictions Bridges did, with wooden tones and such.As can be seen, this was a mixed bag for me to watch. It will be a disappointment for those who really enjoy the source work, and children may find it to grey and dull. The voice acting was wooden as well, and fell flat throughout the film. Even so, the interesting dual animation styles, the nods to the source work, and the cool fantasy elements to the film make it a more enjoyable watch than not. It is worth a shot for those with kids, and adults may get some good laughs and heartfelt moments out of it. All in all, a fairly enjoyable film with some unfortunate flaws, but still an interesting modern take on a classic children's tale. 6/10