The BFG

What hap­pens when the uni­ver­sal­ly acclaimed pow­er­house of emo­tion­al film­mak­ing that is Steven Spiel­berg adapts a tale by an author cher­ished for his unique strange­ness? In his adult books, Roald Dahl rel­ished grotes­querie. Even his children’s sto­ries pos­sess details designed to push imag­i­na­tions to their dark­est cor­ners. Pub­lished in 1982, ​‘The BFG’ is ded­i­cat­ed to Dahl’s daugh­ter, Olivia, who died aged sev­en, and illus­trat­ed crude­ly by his faith­ful artist, Quentin Blake.

Fans of the book’s weird­ness may find them­selves grap­pling with the film’s tone ini­tial­ly. Although live-action and tac­tile ani­ma­tion is har­mo­nious­ly com­bined, the look is too smooth to pass as authen­tic, like a rich kid who dress­es hero­in chic. Raggedy creepi­ness is sand­ed down. Pro­duc­tion design is pris­tine, unlike any stage Dahl ever built. Still, judged in its own right, there’s lit­tle to object to in an adven­ture fan­ta­sy about soli­tary out­siders who help each oth­er through friend­ship, which evokes Spielberg’s own E.T.

The film looks fan­tas­tic. Mark Rylance is vir­tu­al­ly unrecog­nis­able beneath The BFG’s flap­ping ears and mas­sive hoot­er. With­in 10 min­utes he has plucked pre­co­cious bespec­ta­cled child, Sophie (Ruby Barn­hill) from her orphan­age and is leap­ing over oceans, moun­tains and through clouds to a soar­ing John Williams score.

The BFG lives behind a water­fall in a spa­cious cave filled with, among oth­er things, a tree, labelled bot­tles of dreams and snoz­zcum­bers (mag­goty cousins to the cucum­ber). Sophie relax­es when she realis­es that her kid­nap­per is the lone veg­e­tar­i­an sophis­ti­cate among his pri­mal neigh­bour­ing giants who are evoca­tive­ly-named: Flesh­lum­peater, Bonecrunch­er, Man­hug­ger, Child­chew­er, Meat­drip­per, Giz­zardgulper, Maid­mash­er, Blood­bot­tler and The Butch­er Boy. All Dahl’s lin­guis­tic inven­tions are present and (in)correct, from The BFG’s idio­syn­crat­ic speech to his tip­ple of choice, frob­scot­tle, and its after-effect, whiz­zpop­ping. Spiel­berg has enor­mous fun with frob­scot­tle in a scene that should have younger view­ers howl­ing with delight.

Before larks can ensue, the spec­tre of men­ace comes pound­ing on the door. It is Flesh­lum­peater (Jemaine Clement), a rude, deep-voiced he-man whose sleep has been inter­rupt­ed by jabelling (talk­ing). He has come to see if there are any beans (humans) to eat. ​“Runt” is how he address­es The BFG, whose big­ness only exists in rela­tion to humans. Among giants, he is small enough to throw around for sport, and indeed, this does hap­pen. His arc involves learn­ing to stand up for him­self, with help from bossy and it turns out, fear­less Sophie.

The BFG is a won­der­ful char­ac­ter. A ragged-trousered Jesus with a West Coun­try accent, he lives to atone for the child-eat­ing mis­deeds of the oth­er giants. ​“They takes so I gives back. I blow my dreams about.” This last sen­tence is lit­er­al truth. The BFG catch­es dreams, which fizz around by a lake in var­i­ous colours, like fairies in Peter Pan, and then walks the streets at night, blow­ing them through children’s win­dows. Once Spiel­berg begins to fly with this huge metaphor for hope, incred­i­ble cin­e­mat­ic moments start com­ing thick and fast.

One par­tic­u­lar scene seals the deal: Sophie is tak­en back to the orphan­age by The BFG, who fears for her safe­ty in the land of the giants. She miss­es her friend and starts talk­ing to the air, know­ing that he hears every­thing with his pen­du­lous ears. She says she will jump. She does so. She is falling and then – just in time – the giant hand is there, to Williams’ reli­able orches­tral eupho­ria. The fact that Spiel­berg con­jures moments that coa­lesce won­der, spec­ta­cle and joy film-after-film does not dimin­ish either the direc­tor or his work. These moments are what makes him great. We are lucky to have him.

The dia­logue, from the screen­play adapt­ed by the late great Melis­sa Math­i­son, is so wise and sad. A lot of the visu­al pow­er comes from Gulliver’s Trav­els-style con­trasts in size. Through this con­cep­tu­al fix­ture, Spiel­berg flex­es his mus­cles for humour and poignance, often at the same time. Mean­while, dreams become increas­ing­ly impor­tant. They are a way of reach­ing the Queen (Pene­lope Wilton) – reach high­er pow­ers by touch­ing their sub­con­scious and then enlist their help is one avail­able read­ing of the film’s subtext.

The BFG’s great­est strength is its sim­plic­i­ty. This is a film built for chil­dren that delights with fan­tas­ti­cal details while gen­tly push­ing a heart­felt mes­sage about the pow­er of dreams. It isn’t a total fan­ta­sy. There is a big friend­ly giant blow­ing dreams into people’s heads. The BFG is not a great Roald Dahl adap­tion but it is a delight­ful Steven Spiel­berg movie that proves, once again, that films and dreams are mixed from the same stuff.