If you had Oprah, Mindy Kaling, and Reese Witherspoon in your movie, would you just let them stand around? That’s pretty much what happens in this version of A Wrinkle in Time. The prevailing opinion was that A Wrinkle in Time was “unfilmable.” The current film certainly provides proof that might be true, a least in this case. I read Madeleine L’Engle’s classic back in the early 1960s. Madeleine L’Engle had the same problems J. K. Rowling did in trying to get her book published. The fact that the lead character was female (and smart!) made the book a Hard Sell. A Wrinkle in Time won the Newbery Medal, Sequoyah Book Award, and Lewis Carroll Shelf Award and went on to become a best selling children’s book.
Basically, A Wrinkle in Time is a child’s search for her father. Meg Murray is a bitter 13-year-old trying to deal with the mysterious disappearance of her father. Meg’s little brother, Charles Wallace, and Meg’s schoolmate, Calvin O’Keefe, join her on a galactic journey to find her father aided by the powers of Oprah, Mindy Kaling, and Reese Witherspoon’s alien characters. Chris Pine plays Meg’s father, but he isn’t given much to do either. This is a very static film.
If you’re going to see this movie version of A Wrinkle in Time set the bar low. GRADE: C