Wonder is wonderfully realistic. It shows kids being kids, cruel, then reluctantly accepting of someone different in their midst. The message is kindness and it comes across in a film that’s a heart tugger without tugging too much.
Jacob Tremblay (The Room) plays a boy with a disease that causes facial abnormalities called mandibulofacial dysostosis. He wore protheses, contact lenses, dentures and more to make a mask that took 2 hours of makeup each day to portray Auggie. He admits it was uncomfortable but that he didn’t mind. Writer/Director Steve Chbosky was amazed at how the young actor became the character every time he put on the mask, but went right back to being Jacob when he took it off. same with a space helmet he wore as his character to hide his face.
Julia Roberts is the Mom, Isabel who home-schooled him but says it’s time for her to let go and let him go to a regular school. She and Nate, played by Owen Wilson, are his sensitive and loving parents and you see them worried how Auggie’s transition will go. But they’re also fun. There is a lot of humor in this film. They play honest and open with Auggie and it makes all the difference.
Roberts read the book to her kids and was hooked. She reached out to play the part of Isabel Pullman and thinks Writer/Director Steven Chbosky (The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Beauty and the Beast) had just the right stuff to create a film faithful to the best selling book by R.J. Palacio. Writer Steven Conrad (TV’s Patriot, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty) co-wrote the screenplay.
The overhead shots of Auggie in is Star Wars studded room and with Chewbacca as his imaginary good buddy at school made the actor very happy because he really is a Star Wars nerd. And it’s good to see education shown in a good light for a change. Mandy Patinkin as the understanding principal and actor/rapper Daveed Diggs (Hamilton, Blackish) as Auggie’s cool teacher, Mr. Brown, are fair and positive.
The scenes showing the ups and downs of Auggie being wary and eventually making some friends at school are well portrayed by the way they react to each other. Most notable is his on again off again relationship with Jack Will played by Noah Jupe (Suburbicon, The Night Manager) who wants to be a good guy but doesn’t want to be shut out by the rest of the guys. You believe their tentative relationship. And you’ll want to shout yay when Millie Davis (Orphan Black) as Summer decides to takes a stand. The anti-bullying message comes through without beating you over the head.
Even more refreshing is seeing things from Auggie’s sister’s, point of view. Via, played by Isabel Vidovic, has been relatively ignored because the focus has been on Auggie’s situation since he was born. She is as loving as her parents toward Auggie, but she’s been ignored to the point of telling people she’s an only child to avoid the discussion about Auggie. Sweet but strong, Vidovic gets to show Via grow and develop to get the attention she, too, deserves. You rarely get a complete picture of a whole family as you do in this film.
This could have been a very heavy and depressing movie, but Chbosky keeps it light. He says Wilson added some improv and fun on the set that sometimes turned into a giggle fest. Even Tremblay thinks Wilson is one of the funniest men on the planet and we think one of the best roles we’ve seen from Wilson yet.
This is a good holiday film for the family. The director says he told the young actor to just be a kid and that’s what you get in this movie. Auggie says it in the film. He just wanted to be treated like a normal kid. Tremblay’s favorite part is the ending which even made his real Mom cry. But all he hopes is that people who see this film will get Auggie’s message. “Just choose to be kind.”
Lionsgate 1 hour 53 minutes PG
