Review 479: Charlotte's Web

Charlotte's Web is a charming, whimsical, touching and poignant family film that beautifully encapsulates the charm and delight of its beloved source material.

Based on the children's novel Charlotte's Web by E. B. White, Fern Arable (Dakota Fanning) is a young girl growing up on her family's farm. When a sow gives birth to some piglets, Fern's father, John (Kevin Anderson) intends to do away with the runt of litter, but Fern has become attached to the little pig and persuades her father to let him live. The pig, whom she names Wilbur (Dominic Scott Kay), becomes Fern's pet, but when he grows larger, he's put in the care of Homer Zuckerman (Gary Basaraba), Fern's uncle who owns a farm down the road.
Fern is still able to visit Wilbur regularly and it soon occurs to both of them that pigs tend to have a limited life expectancy on a farm and that unless something unusual happens, Wilbur will eventually become someone's dinner. Charlotte A. Cavatica (Julia Roberts), a friendly spider, hatches a plan to make Wilbur seem special enough to save by weaving messages about the "terrific" pig into her web and she soon persuades her barnyard friends to join in her plan.

The plot is simple and stays true to the original book.
It's a story about Death, Change, Innocence and Friendship.

Death: Death is bought forth by that of Charlotte's Web. According to author, Norton D. Kinghorn, Charlotte's web acts as a barrier between two worlds: The worlds of life and death.
Scholar Amy Ratelle says that through Charlotte's continual killing and eating of flies, the concept of death becomes normal to Wilbur. Wilbur constantly has death on his mind at night when he's worrying over wether he'll be made into meat for human consumption.
Yet even in the face of death, life continues and ultimate goodness wins out.
As with the novel, audiences learn that death can be delayed but not avoided forever.
For a family film to tackle such heavy topics is both bold and daring.

Change: Charlotte's Web can be seen as a signifier of change. That change can be interpreted as both the human and the farm/barn world. For both of these worlds, change, like death, is something that can't be avoided. Along with the changing seasons throughout the story, the characters also go through their own changes: Both Wilbur and Fern go through their changes to transition from childhood closer to adulthood. This evidenced by Wilbur coming to terms with death and Fern's increased maturity. Due to him coming to terms with death, Wilbur is able to take care of Charlotte's children.
Rather than accept the changes that are forced upon them, the characters aim to go beyond the limits of change. Wilbur goes through a change when he switches locations: When he moves from Fern's house to Homer Zuckerman's farm, he goes from being a loved family pet to a farm animal.

Innocence: Throughout the film, Fern goes from being a

Friendship:

Director Gary Winick's direction is sensitive, the cinematography is beautiful and captures the beauty and appeal of Somerset County, Maine, the score by Danny Elfman is delightfully and appropriately lush and lovely, the production design is terrific, the costumes are

Fern makes a decision that's really tough for her in giving up Wilbur

On the animal side, Dominic Scott Kay's wide eyed innocence and help to
surrounding and supporting him on this journey are a bunch of colourful animals voiced by some very well chosen A-Listers including Gussy and Golly, two geese (Oprah Winfrey and Cedric the Entertainer); two cows Bitsy and Betsy (Kathy Bates and Reba McEntire) Samuel the sheep (John Cleese) and Ike the horse (Robert Redford) all of whom lend their own unique voice to the situation and