First Take: IF - rumours of the U certificate’s death are greatly exaggerated

SYNOPSIS: A young girl who goes through a difficult experience begins to see everyone’s imaginary friends who have been left behind as their real-life friends have grown up.

Well, here was the surprise for this year’s marathon - when it opened to a 48% on Rotten Tomatoes, a lot was made of John Krasinski’s first foray outside of the more adult realms (having done A Quiet Place and several episodes directing The US Office). But having now finally got round to seeing it, for the first time I have to say to the higher ups - you’re wrong, but kinda right.

Krasinski does a hell of a job at the helm of writing and directing this U certificate - yes, this a U certificate - film, clocking in at a neat 1 hour 44 minutes. Cynically, it could’ve been cut down a bit to get it to 1 hour 40 (including credits), but to do that would ruin a lot of the work done with choreographer Mandy Moore (of La La Land, and I can’t believe I’m writing this on the blog in light of its cinema release last year, Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour fame) to make a ‘live action Pixar movie’ as it has been described - and that fits this film perfectly. Yes, it has the heart - the script is a major part of that - but it also has the key life lessons that Pixar films have lacked in recent years. But sadly the ending did feel a little predictable, which was my only minor issue with it - saying all that, it is shot really well by Janusz Kaminski and on scoring duties, it was a joy to see Michael Giacchino’s name on the credit roll - which explains why he had less involvement on another film which has been featured this weekend.

With the cast, as well as directing and taking a role himself Krasinski brought some of his talented friends along - namely Ryan Reynolds, with SNL alumni Bobby Moynihan, Liza Colon-Zayas and Fiona Shaw rounding out the live action talent, but the undoubted star of this film is Cailey Fleming. Having honed her craft on the sets of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, The Walking Dead and Loki, to lead a film like this, at this age takes some doing. A big career potentially beckons - and on the other side, the voice cast are more voice cameos. Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Steve Carell are the two most prominently featured names, with Emily Blunt, Jon Stewart, George Clooney, Bradley Cooper, Awkwafina, Bill Hader, Matt Damon, Blake Lively… it is a who’s who in the Maximum Effort (Reynolds’ production house) and Sunday Night Productions (Krasinski’s production company) phonebooks, with it also being the last film for Louis Gossett Jr. - all in all, this film deserved a bit more love from critics.

THE VERDICT

If is a film that takes the best bits of the archetypical 1990s family movie and applies it to a modern cinemagoing landscape - obviously it is making its way onto digital at this point, so it is a miracle a screening went on when it did, but this, had it released officially around July 26th, would be one hell of a summer holidays film.

RATING: 3.5/5