Pete's Dragon: Review

Finally, here's my Pete's Dragon NON-Spoiler review. I took way too long to see this movie. I love Disney movies to death. I have actually never seen the original Pete's Dragon.

"What did you think?" I LOVED! this movie. The opening shot looks beautiful. It was awesome right from the start. It grabbed me emotionally so fast and so tight. I have never emotionally cried in a movie, believe it or not. The only time I've cried in a movie is when I was younger and the movie scared me. Making me cry in a movie has never been done. I have come very close twice. The first time was Tom Hanks in Cast Away - which I can't say which scene without spoiling Cast Away. The second time was Robert De Niro in Silver Linings Playbook. Robert De Niro always plays the sassy, tough guy and I love him. But the first time I have ever seen him cry was in Silver Linings Playbook and if the scene had carried on for another thirty seconds, I guarantee you I would have cried. And the third time was today. It wasn’t five minutes into the movie before I was getting emotional. I fell in love with Pete and his dragon named Eliott. I have a soft spot for dogs and Eliott looks like a dog. I was on the edge of crying for 60% of the movie. I got so invested in the characters. I had so many goosebumps in the theater.

Let me get my complaints over with. There were a few songs that I really didn’t like. I don’t mean the score, the score was incredible. I mean songs that had lyrics. The songs I thought were cheesy and were just wanting me to be sad at the wrong moments. The actor who played Pete was good for the most part. There were a couple of scenes he didn’t do amazing in. There were a couple of scenes where the editing was a bit rough. I would have maybe liked a better reveal of Elliot the dragon. But that’s not really a complaint, that’s just something I would I think could have been improved. There were a couple of really bad side-actors. The dialogue was really good for the most part. Some lines, I thought, were dumb. And finally, my biggest complaint was Karl Urban. I go back and forth with this guy. When he was Bones in Star Trek I thought he was really good. But then he does a movie like Red and I hate him. I thought his acting wasn't very good in this movie. His character in Pete’s Dragon was a total jerk. His character I felt was the worst kind of person in humanity.

Other than those minor complaints this movie was really really good. I thought the cast, besides Karl Urban, were good. I really liked Robert Redford’s acting and his character. I liked Bryce Dallas Howard more than usual. There wasn’t much humor in the movie, but the jokes that were in it weren’t bad or cliche. I liked how the town that movie is set in actually felt like a small place. I liked how it wasn’t something that was spread out across the whole country. It stayed in the small town. A lot of the movie is really happy. There were a lot of moments that made me smile. I cared so much about Pete and Elliot. I want a dragon after seeing this movie. And the movie has the best possible ending I could have asked for. 

This movie felt so short to me. When a movie ends really quick and you don’t even notice, that’s a really good sign. This was such a beautiful story. It is definitely one of my favorite Disney remakes. Disney always brings a little bit of magic into their movies. Pete’s Dragon got Disney magic at it’s best. If you can find the time go see this movie before it leaves theaters I definitely recommend it.