Movie Review: Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events directed by Brad Siberling

January 15th, 2010 | 2.5-3 Treasure Chests, Movie Review

by Cook Cutlery, guest reveiwer

Title: Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events
Director: Brad Siberling
Run Time: 108 minutes
Rated: PG

Summary: When the Baudilaire children are at the beach they are told that their parents had died in the fire and that their house was destroyed along with their parents. Orphaned, they go live with Count Olaf, a relative that none of them have heard of or meet. While the kids are living there they are given many chores and are not treated very nicely... and something is quite clearly afoot!

Why I watched this movie:

I had just finished reading the first book, The Bad Beginning. The movie itself is actually more than just the first book. I'm not sure how many, but I would guess it is at least about the first 3 or 4 books in the series.

Like:

I liked the actress, Emily Browning, that played Violet. She's very pretty. Browning looked just as I imagined Violet and was splendid to watch.
The way how none of the kids were going to give up; they kept on going. It's very admirable.
I liked how Violet did what was right for Klaus and Sunny. For instance when she does the play towards the end of the movie even though she really didn’t want to do it. She did it because if she didn’t Sunny was going to be dropped in the cage that was at the top of the tower.

Dislike:

The way Count Olaf (Jim Carrey) treated the children by like giving them many hard chores and then later striking Klaus a cross the face. I didn't like it in the book either.
The movie didn’t stick to the book. One change (outside of the fact it's more than one book long) in the movie is that Klaus (Liam Aiken) was the one trying to save Sunny from the tower, when in the book it was Violet. I suppose it is meant to give Aiken something to do. Also Klaus was suppose to have glasses but he doesn’t. He should have glasses. After all where would Harry Potter be without his?

Buy: A Series of Unfortunate Events (Full Screen Edition), Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (Widescreen Edition), Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (2-Disc Special Collector's Edition), Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (Spanish Edition)

Rating: 3 out of 5 treasure chests.