Winter's Tale is an adaptation of the novel of the same name. Having not read the novel, I have no idea how much they failed at adapting it, but watching this leaves me with no doubt that they did, because Winter's Tale is a trainwreck from start to finish.
The storyline of Winter's Tale starts in a disjointed fashion, providing new characters without any context. It takes several minutes to even make sense of what's happening, and even then it's all so ridiculous that it fails to make any sense. Of course, just when the plot even resembles something coherent, the film throws a large plot twist that again puts you in a new scene with no context.
Of course, even if you can follow the story, there's nothing there to really compel you to care about it. The characters are bland and dull, to the point that they might as well not exist if it weren't for the bizarre screenplay that keeps having them do the strangest things. Winter's Tale will leave you baffled. It's stuffed to the brim with ludicrous elements, which keep the movie from being dull, but don't do any favours to its quality. Frequently, you won't so much be engrossed in the movie as enthralled to see what bout of insanity the movie throws at you next. Which is good, because without the baffling screenplay the film would probably be boring.
There are times that the film seems to resemble something sane, but these moments tend to be cloyingly sweet scenes where the protagonist, Peter Lake, interacts with one of the child characters in the film. These scenes are clearly intended to be cute, but in between all the insanity they fail. It's clear this film doesn't intend to be comedic, but there's a constant undercurrent of unintentional comedy throughout. And yet, the film is ignorant of this. That, indeed, is perhaps one of Winter's Tale's few successes. It takes itself so seriously in the face of such preposterous events that it's hilarious.
Oh, and did I mention that this is a romantic movie? The film has so many ridiculous fantasy elements that it's easy to overlook the romance present in the first half. Now, I say romance, but it's actually an awkwardly-written non-relationship of the type deconstructed by Frozen last year. Peter meets the girl. They fall in love immediately, because of destiny or something. Amusingly, they keep using the word "miracle" in a number of ways that aren't actually in line with the word's actual definition.
Visually, Winter's Tale is actually fairly competent. There are a lot of pretty visuals, and the cinematography is perfectly reasonable if not outstanding. These visuals aren't necessarily wasted, because some of the absolutely ridiculous moments in the film wouldn't be nearly as funny without them.
As for the acting, it's consistently bad. Most of the actors chew the scenery at regular intervals, which benefits the film, as these over-the-top performances only serve to make its complete seriousness even funnier. Also, the movie has Will Smith as Lucifer, in a role where he chews even more scenery than the other characters and sports CGI pointed teeth at one point.
Don't pay money for Winter's Tale. It's an atrocious movie. However, it's an atrocious movie that might be worth a watch, as its ludicrous script renders the film unintentionally hilarious. So, maybe if you can catch it on TV (or perhaps find other means of watching it) it'd be worth taking out on a Bad Movie Night. Just don't expect it to be halfway decent.
3/10
Extended thoughts (warning: spoilers)
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