Bridge to Terabithia

Katherine Paterson's emotional childrens book was adapted very well by Jeff Stockwell and Katherine's son, David Paterson. Like the book, the story deals with two friend's adventures in the imaginary land of Terabithia where anything can happen. The life of Jesse Aarons reveals that he is a misfit character at home with the use of two bickering teen sisters and seemingly preoccupied parents as well as at school due to the school bullies that constantly pick on him and a music teacher he has a crush on.

The imaginative aspects of the story brought the audience back to when they were a kid playing make-believe in their backyard or fort they had built due to the realistic portrayal of how the imagination can work between two people. Unlike the trailer, which marketed the movie as more of a Narnia type adventure story, this really stuck close to the book and echoed the themes and lessons Paterson told years ago in the classic book.

The only problem I personally had with the movie was the ending. The reason I balked at it was because it felt alien when Jesse brings his little sister to Terabitha and makes her princess. It wasn't their story ... it was the friendship between Jesse and Leslie - but as time only tells, obviously the story is a classic because the author knew what she was doing. The imaginative creatures, most of which the audience has never seen before, reveal themselves in applause as the little sister enters and the audience wonders, "why?" The audience wasn't pulled from their seats in applause with the characters, like when watching the ending of Titanic, because the audience didn't care about the little sister as much as they cared about Jesse and Leslie. The audience wanted Jesse to see Leslie one last time in Terabithia, after all, it would be nice to know that she will live on forever in Jesse's imagination, as told in Finding Neverland. In conclusion, this movie is self-contained, well adapted, and climaxes fine when Jesse's Dad hugs him in comfort in Terabithia after Leslie's death ... but the movie keeps running in efforts of avoiding a downer ending. All I have to say about that is that it seems to have worked for the book, now known as a classic, and made the story different and well-heard because of it.

Christopher
www.ScriptDig.com