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James and the Giant Peach is a weird, wonderful movie from the minds of director Henry Selick and producer Tim Burton. A Disney film released in 1996, it came during the Renaissance boom that saw Disney dominate the box office after a bleak ’80s with no real big hits. Coming after smashes like The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, and Beauty and the Beast, James and the Giant Peach was a bold proclamation that the studio was still willing to take risks.
Prior to James and the Giant Peach, Selick and Burton found major success with the children’s holiday film, The Nightmare Before Christmas. Burton’s signature goth punk aesthetic blossomed in the now-Christmas classic, so the fact that Selik and Burton were once again teaming up for a Disney animated film seemed to be a recipe for success. But, with its haunting animation, dark story, and oddball insects helping sail a scared orphan boy to New York City, it failed to connect with mainstream audiences and is one of Disney’s most underrated films.
What Is ‘James and the Giant Peach’ About?
A great adaptation based on the children’s novel by Roald Dahl, it tells the story of a neglected and abused English orphan, James (Paul Terry), who lives with his volatile aunts, Aunt Sponge and Aunt Spiker, played by extremely creepy Miriam Gargoyles and Joanna Lumley. Always having dreamed of traveling the world, James is visited by the Magic Man, played by an excellent Pete Postlethwaite, who gifts him magical, worm-like tongues. They then cause a peach on his property to expand and grow and also turn James into a miniature-sized boy, as the film transitions into stop-motion animation. James then crawls into the peach to discover a whole new world. The peach is inhabited by various insects voiced by Simon Callow, Richard Dreyfuss, David Thewlis, Susan Sarandon, and Gargoyles. The centipedes, earthworms, and spiders, together with James, sail to New York City to start a new life.
Richard Drefyuss Voices a Lively, New York-Accented Centipede
Out of all the crew, Dreyfus shines as a Brooklyn native, Mr. Centipede, with a gruff, heavily accented voice that contributes comic relief to an at times pretty scary children’s movie. Among all the respectable English insects, Mr. Centipede sticks out like a sore thumb, and Drefyuss’s voice work does an excellent job maintaining a vibrato that masks a barely hidden insecurity of failure as Mr. Centipede leads the crew towards New York.
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The most visually stunning scene comes when Mr. Centipede toils with a group of bloodthirsty pirates under frozen water, and you can even see a cameo of the skeleton head of Jack from The Nightmare Before Christmas. It’s a genuinely scary scene, but Dreyfuss’s dry humor balances it out. The similarities to the animation in The Nightmare Before Christmas are all there, and as the skeleton pirates stretch Mr. Centipede’s spine, the gothic horror that has become so synonymous with Burton’s dark style takes over while remaining playful enough for children.
‘James and the Giant Peach’ Is a Dark Musical Fantasy, and a Cult Classic
Selick finds the perfect balance between playfulness and darkness like he’s done in other children’s movies, such as Coraline. With the film’s combination of both stop-motion animation and starting and ending it in live-action, it’s a wonderful exploration of the power of children’s imagination and their ability to create their own worlds. Dealing with themes of loneliness, child abuse, and sadness, James and the Giant Peach didn’t talk down to its audience and entrusted kids to understand and handle the subject material.
David Thewlish is particularly moving in his role as the shy, sunglass-wearing Mr. Earthworm. His quivering, shaking voice portrays a certain kind of anxiety that is palpable. As he wonders exactly what he’s useful for in a sweet scene with James, Mr. Earthworm is encouraged to continue to be himself. It’s the kind of film Disney champions, and a moving story about friendship and outsiders. It was destined to fall short, as it proved to be too bold during a decade where the studio was instead creating many big-budget films filled with romanticism. Now an animated cult classic, it remains a daring, beautiful movie.
An orphan who lives with his two cruel aunts befriends anthropomorphic bugs who live inside a giant peach, and they embark on a journey to New York City.
- Release Date
- April 12, 1996
- Runtime
- 79 Minutes
James and the Giant Peach is available to stream on Disney+ in the U.S.
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