When it comes to live action movies, Disney knows how to combine quirk and fantasy on a grand scale. It started with Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland and is growing with the latest The Nutcracker and the Four Realms.
Prussian author E. T. A. Hoffmann wrote the novella The Nutcracker and the Mouse King in 1816. It became the subject of Russian maestro Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet The Nutcracker in 1892. Since then, the story kept appearing in popular culture via animation movies like Tom and Jerry: A Nutcracker Tale; shows like Monty Python's Flying Circus and even video games like BioShock.
Part of the ballet made an appearance in Disney's 1940 movie Fantasia. After 70 years, Lasse Hallström of What's Eating Gilbert Grape has directed the live-action version for the House of the Mouse.
Official synopsis of the movie reads,
All Clara (Mackenzie Foy) wants is a key – a one-of-a-kind key that will unlock a box that holds a priceless gift from her late mother. A golden thread, presented to her at godfather Drosselmeyer’s (Morgan Freeman) annual holiday party, leads her to the coveted key—which promptly disappears into a strange and mysterious parallel world. It’s there that Clara encounters a soldier named Phillip (Jayden Fowora-Knight), a gang of mice and the regents who preside over three Realms: Land of Snowflakes, Land of Flowers and Land of Sweets. Clara and Phillip must brave the ominous Fourth Realm, home to the tyrant Mother Ginger (Helen Mirren), to retrieve Clara’s key and hopefully return harmony to the unstable world.
Hoping to cash in on the holiday season cheer, Disney released the first official trailer for the movie almost a year before its release.
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Apart from above-mentioned cast members, The Nutcracker and the Four Realms also starrs Keira Knightley as sugar plum fairy, Matthew Macfadyen as Mr Stahlbaum, Miranda Hart as Dew Drop Fairy, Richard E Grant, Jack Whitehall, and renowned American dancer Misty Copeland in pivotal roles.
The movie is set to release on November 2, 2018.
