The movie is perfect in every sense. Plays are awesome, production is perfect with attention to smallest details, cast selection is flawless, everyone is in his or her place... but at the end it is just the direct remake of David Lean's 1948 version which was perfect by itself. The movie had no added excitement, like in one of the mini-series based on the novel, Oliver managed o solve his birth mystery and eventually found his true relatives. I don't know if that was the case for the original work but there is no sign of it in this movie, basically it focused on the more dramatic parts of the story rather than more exiting sections. Highly watchable movie but don't expect anything new, can be considered a waste of time somehow but I enjoyed it anyways as I like the original story. Everything is perfect but I can not give more than 5 out of 10 to a direct and unnecessary remake.

An adaptation of the classic Dickens tale, where an orphan (Barney Clark) meets a pickpocket on the streets of London. From there, he joins a household of boys who are trained to steal for their master.Roman Polanski directs, making this (to my knowledge) his third adaptation of a classic work of literature, following "MacBeth" and "Tess".Ben Kingsley plays Fagin and does a great job. However, my dislike of Dickens and his world makes me generally not care."God is holy, God is truth" overlooking a room full of starving orphaned boys in a workhouse cafeteria is a glorious shot, and "Please sir, I want some more." Words that spark a revolution.The idea of making a new version of "Oliver Twist" was suggested by Emmanuelle Seigner, director Roman Polanski's wife, while he was looking for a plot that their children would find interesting. I like that -- it's a family film!

Although I admire Polanski as a director, I must admit that I did not like his interpretation compared to BBC's Oliver Twist. If you have not watched the movie yet, and if you have only one night to watch the Oliver Twist, then I strongly suggest you to watch BBC (2007) adaptation.When I was watching the BBC adaptation, I was not only captured by the narrative but also by the actors. The cameraman was right to focus on the faces as I could really understand from their faces what it means to be part of Oliver Twist's life. Also the settings (Lincoln's Inn) was so real and I could not feel this in Polanski's movie. I was staring at the London scenes to make sure Polanski was not using some dull pictures to depict London as if real.To sum up, BBC makes a difference!

Charles Dickens' imagination, wrote George Orwell, "overwhelms everything like a kind of weed", and it's true that his works translate to the screen extremely well for that reason. Whether or not you also agree with Orwell that Dickens' characters "start off as magic lantern slides and they end up by getting mixed up in a third-rate movie" is a matter for personal taste - though only the grouchiest critic would brand Polanski's take on this family favourite anything like a massive let-down. What Dickens is best at, of course, is story - and here, Polanski delivers; there's also a sense he's aiming for the definitive version - more knockabout than David Lean's, darker than Carol Reed's. However, like those cinematic predecessors it's necessarily rendered in shorthand and distilled to the prime components: orphans, beadles, pickpockets, prostitutes and kindly benefactors. It looks great, or at least 'Dickensian', as screenwriter Ronald Harwood says: "not the historical sociological truth - that's boring", and Polanski's London is a hyperreal dystopian theme park where everyone seems to be spilling out of taverns in mid-fistfight. Kingsley's practically unrecognisable as Fagin, while Oliver (Clark) isn't half as soppy as forebear Mark Lester, even sporting a bit of an Estuary twang. Bur Foreman as Bill Sikes is no Oliver Reed - whose own portrayal still has the capacity to turn children's matinees into panicked paddling pools. Also, the mind hiccups at crucial plot points: it's Lionel Bart's glorious songs we most associate with Oliver, and tellingly, this version feels strangely hollower for their exclusion.