My wife and I watched this movie with our 3 young children and all of us were enthralled. No double entandres, no evil monsters, no four letter words, just great family entertainment and values.We only wish we had found it sooner. In an age when Hollywood feels that there must be sex, violence, foul language or "adult" subplots, this film stands out for it's honesty and proves that a great film and a great story doesn't need to be trashed up.It may not be true to the book, but who cares...it's a movie. And a fun and entertaining one that the entire family can watch and enjoy...including grandma.

Big, big error. No children were evacuated from London until WW2. How could they make a mistake like that and say it was 1917 evacuations??? Otherwis the film was enjoyable. Don't have enough to say for myself to write 10 lines. Can I just repeat all this again please? Big, big error. No children were evacuated from London until WW2. How could they make a mistake like that and say it was 1917 evacuations??? Otherwis the film was enjoyable. Don't have enough to say for myself to write 10 lines. Can I just repeat all this again please? Big, big error. No children were evacuated from London until WW2. How could they make a mistake like that and say it was 1917 evacuations??? Otherwis the film was enjoyable. Don't have enough to say for myself to write 10 lines. Can I just repeat all this again please?

The Great War breaks out and Daddy is a brave pilot who goes off to carry out some unsightly business to put Jerry in his place. Mummy is doing her bit as a nurse, so the five children are evacuated to their barmy uncle in the country, where a secret passageway takes them to a mischievous sand fairy and the beginning of a magical adventure.Based on a book written the best part of a century ago, they don't make stories like this anymore. And there's a reason. The men fly planes and author books; the women change bandages and clean house. The boys lead the way with their compasses and nighttime furloughs; the girls do what they are told and play violin - badly. Fat kids who wear specs are nasty. All the kids speak in those clipped, vowel-flattening accents that are soppy and prim but which a certain economic class of English people cultivate. On top of the snobbery and yearning for Imperial Albion, there are plot holes a five-year-old would not tolerate. I mean that literally - my son was asking why the father disappeared before sunset, why the compass didn't just drop from his hand as he disappeared. The film at least tries to aim strictly for the kids, until a completely inappropriate and unfunny monologue by Eddie Izzard (what a waste of genuine comic talent) plays over the final credits.No doubt the five percent of British schoolkids who go to expensive public schools in the UK will find it all such a jolly wheeze. For the other 95 percent of British families who no longer live in the 19th century, the good news is Wall-E, Ratatouille and Wallace and Gromit are all out on DVD.

This is one of those "family" movies that I can't imagine having much appeal to anyone over about 9. A group of siblings discovers a "sand fairy" (yes, really) conveniently located at the end of a not-so-secret passage at the country home of their eccentric uncle, to which they've been evacuated from the London blitz. ...And there you have it, all in one sentence. The story is about the role of magic in childhood and the danger of getting wishes fulfilled, but neither of these issues is examined in a way that would be interesting to adults or instructive to children (or vice versa!). The only reason I can think of for watching this is to see how starkly Freddie Highmore's outstanding talent stands out from the rest of the mediocre performances.