Roger Deakins and featuring Maggie Smith as the
housekeeper, Holland’s “Secret Garden” (currently
streaming on HBO Max) is tough to top.
Mundan’s film, scripted by Jack Thorne, softens
some of the edges of its central character,
Mary Lennox (Dixie Egerickx). The first line of
Burnett’s book refers to the orphaned Mary,
whose parents never wanted her, as “the most
disagreeable child ever seen.”
After a brief prologue in India, where Mary’s
parents die of cholera, she arrives at the
gloomy and gothic Misselthwaite Manor on the
Yorkshire Moors. There she’s been taken in by
her uncle Archibald Craven (Colin Firth) who,
himself, is grieving the loss of his wife. Mary
finds herself generally locked in her room, and
only gradually does she encounter Archibald or
his largely bedridden son Colin (Edan Hayhurst).
Her first and for a while only friend is Dixon
(Amir Wilson), the gardener’s son. Together, they
discover, behind stone walls and ivy, the hidden,
dreamlike garden that will propel and reflect
their collective healing.
The best that can be said about Mundan’s
“Secret Garden” is that it doesn’t try to gin up the
story or gloss over its themes. This is a pleasingly
patient film that honestly tackles grief, death
and rejuvenation without sentimentality. Given
today’s average wide-release children’s films,
that makes “The Secret Garden” a verdant oasis.
“The Secret Garden,” a STX Entertainment
release, is rated PG by the Motion Picture
Association of America for thematic elements
and some mild peril. Running time: 102 minutes.
Two and a half stars out of four.