Pixar’s movies can be magical.  This one literally has magic in it — it is infused with magic — but I didn’t find it magical.  Actually I was rather bored much of the time, until the climax, where the story almost redeems itself enough to make me feel good about it.  Almost.

Dan Scanlon’s fantasy takes place in a world where magic used to exist, but where normality has overpowered life and pretty much stamped out everyone’s magical tendencies.  Two brothers, Ian and Barley, are given the opportunity to resurrect their dead father for a day, but something goes wrong and they only get his lower half.  They embark on a quest to finish the process, restore their father and actually talk to him again before he leaves for good.

Some story.  This is not my cup of tea, as I will readily admit.  The film is given charm by the Pixar team and a great deal of life by its voice-over actors, which include Tom Holland, Chris Pratt, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Octavia Spencer.  It is an odd, but somewhat endearing mix of teenage tropes being intertwined with fantastical characters and a genuinely kooky situation.  It all builds to an explosive climax involving a dragon and the notion that magic is about to run rampant again in a world not at all ready for it, which I thought was overproduced and not that interesting.

And yet the characters come through at that moment and save the day.  The story suddenly moved in a direction I didn’t see coming but made perfect sense in hindsight.  It was emotionally and dramatically satisfying and almost made their long, tedious trek to that moment worthwhile.  Again, almost.  Pixar fans are bound to enjoy the film and I think children would have a lot of fun with it (although, what’s with the nasty unicorns?).  For me this isn’t upper-tier Pixar but the ending really goes a long way to rescue it from mediocrity.  ☆ ☆ 1/2.  27 June 2021.