The Secret Kingdom (2023)

The Secret Kingdom (2023). The Secret Kingdom: Directed by Matt Drummond. With Alyla Browne, Alice Parkinson, Sam Everingham, Beth Champion. Story of anxious Peter (12) and his sister Verity (9), taken underground by a garrison of armoured pangolin.

“I have this as a 6/10, but that is out of major respect to the studio and their ambition with this movie. For an Australian film, this is shockingly ambitious and isnu0026#39;t afraid to do big action scenes. Now, some of the CGI is iffy, but itu0026#39;s perfectly fine, given this isnu0026#39;t a major studio release (Iu0026#39;m looking at you Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumainia).u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe kids acting is surprisingly solid; itu0026#39;s always hard to find good child actors, and to find some outside the U. S. is outstanding. Thatu0026#39;s where many of these family adventure movies fall, and itu0026#39;s great that they found good talent. Also, they will probably be great for kids to see themselves in the characters, so thatu0026#39;s a plus.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe main faults of the movie are the generic story and (as I mentioned before) its iffy CGI. The story is serviceable, but itu0026#39;s been done many times before; itu0026#39;s okay to go down the same path, but without enough turns, it ultimately just feels samey and thatu0026#39;s a problem both big and small movies can have. The CGI, at some points, shocked me with how good it was, and I want to give my full praise to Hive Studios Australia; but at other points, I felt like I was ready to pick up the XBOX 360 controller.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe reason why Iu0026#39;m saying this is because they are on a good path and just need to keep pushing a little further to create great CGI through and through.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eI want to keep this review short, but this movie is an absolute trip that, although it doesnu0026#39;t always land on its feet, makes up for in adventurous spirit. If youu0026#39;re a parent looking for a movie for a family movie night Iu0026#39;d highly recommend this one.”