Yahoo Movies Jason Isaacs explains why his Peter Pan is the most faithful adaptation
The film will soon celebrate its 20th anniversary, and the Captain Hook star reflects on its legacy with Yahoo
The 2003 take on Peter Pan is the most faithful adaptation of J M Barrie's children's novel, Jason Isaacs tells Yahoo, because it captures the true essence of the story the author was trying to convey — not by focusing on the boy who would not grow up, but on Wendy Darling.
Directed by P. J. Hogan, the film —which celebrates its 20th anniversary on Christmas Eve— sees Isaacs play both Wendy's father and Peter Pan's iconic nemesis Captain Hook, a casting decision that truly reflected the "potent Freudian story" that Barrie had written according to Isaacs, who speaks about the film as part of his Role Recall interview.
"It's an odd thing the Peter Pan movie, because it's been a huge success since it was made, but when it came out it was catastrophic flop because people thought, 'Oh, I've seen that before'. Actually, no one's ever made a film of Peter Pan before," he says.
"J M Barrie's Peter Pan is about a little girl who's told 'you're not a little girl, you're a woman now it's time to grow up', and those days that meant have a family, have sex, leave your brother's bedroom, stop playing pirates.
"So that night she dreams and creates a world with a little boy with baby teeth who'll always play with her, but there's also a man who is strangely attractive but repulsive as well.
"She's not ready to be attracted to men, and he looks like the only man she knows — which is her father — and that's a really potent Freudian story about mortality and maturity, and no one ever made that."Jason Isaacs
Peter Pan has been adapted for the silver screen multiple times, the most famous is Walt Disney's 1953 animation but there is also the 1991 sequel Hook, which stars Robin Williams and Dustin Hoffman, and recent adaptations like 2015's Pan, starring Hugh Jackman, and a Disney+ film released this year with Jude Law playing the iconic villain.
All of these have one thing in common: they're more about Peter than they are Wendy. The 2003 adaptation challenges this notion by follow the classic tale of Wendy (Rachel Hurd-Wood) and her brothers being brought to Neverland by Peter Pan (Jeremy Sumpter) where they help to defeat Captain Hook, but the story is told from Wendy's perspective.
Reflecting on this version of the story compared to others, Isaacs goes on: "They get obsessed with the boy for some reason, he's a figment of her imagination.
"And there's a reason why [the 2003] film, still decades later, has resonated with so many girls and so many young women."Jason Isaacs
"So many women tell me that's actually their favourite film I've ever been in, because J M Barrie captured that horrifying moment when, as a girl, you realise the world is looking at you as a woman."
Peter Pan is available to buy and rent on digital.
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