Camden New Journal - Movies: Mr Magoriam's Wonder Emporium

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The Review - AT THE MOVIES with WILLIAM HALL
Published: 13 December 2007

Dustin Hoffman in his weirdest role to date as Mr Magorium with “coy assistant” Natalie Portman

Zany toy store fails to amuse

MR MAGORIUM'S WONDER EMPORIUM
Directed by Zach Helm
Certificate U

IS this a madhouse that I see before me? On the surface, very much so. It’s a toy shop of sorts, run by an eccentric old coot calling himself Mr Magorium (Dustin Hoffman) who professes to be 243 years old and shuffles around in a purple suit talking gobbledegook and appearing to be wearing the wrong dentures.
He’s a sprightly old fellow with frizzy grey hair standing on end as if he has stuck his fingers in a light socket. Welcome to the weirdest role of your illustrious career, Dustin.
The dazzlingly colourful store is full of bizarre goodies. Over in the corner is a stuffed camel, jostling for space with a live goose and wandering around amid shelves full of toy animals that blink and come to life when no one’s looking.
All very twee and fanciful, you might think. But appearances are deceptive. When Magorium announces he is about to shuffle off this mortal coil and leave the place to his coy assistant (Natalie Portman) the shop turns nasty. “They’re throwing a temper tantrum,” he declares when the walls change from purple to ominous grey, and the place turns into a little shop of horrors as the toys take on a life of their own to trash the place.
To tidy up his affairs he hires a hard-nosed accountant (played with panache by a straight-faced Jason Bateman) whose life revolves around balance sheets with no time for flights of fancy.
His performance as he gradually unbends to the inevitable and sees the light is the best thing to remedy a film that is so bad it made my toes curl.
Hoffman is almost incomprehensible, but since the dialogue is embarrassingly laboured this may not be a bad thing. I only wonder how they persuaded an actor of his stature to get involved in this outlandish and puerile extravaganza.
Okay, it’s Christmas – so maybe it’s just me?
Bah, humbug!

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