How Strange is Winter's Tale (2014)?

There are certain movies that when you watch them, you are dumbfounded about what you have just seen.  You try to follow along with the story that is being told only to be thrown by the ridiculous twists and turns that it takes.  By the end of the movie, you are at a loss for words as to how it made you feel.  Instead of liking or disliking it, you remain in a state of awe, not knowing what happened, yet knowing everything.  I’ve experienced that before and I will likely experience it again.

Most recently, I experienced this feeling through watching a movie called Winter’s Tale.   It is a 2014 romantic film about the miracles that are experienced throughout life.  It stars Colin Farrell as a thief named Peter Lake who falls in love with the ill Beverly Penn (Jessica Brown Findlay).  Pearly Soames (Russell Crowe) does not like this and attempts to rip the two love-struck people apart in any way that he can.  That plot might not sound all that strange.  Believe me when I say I only scratched the surface with that description.

This post is going to turn out very similar to the post I wrote for Howard the Duck, I think.  I am going to take a look at a lot of the strange and ridiculous parts of the movie by listing them.  The movie was quite odd so it should not be difficult to come up with things to write about.  I should not need to say this but I feel obligated to anyway.  There will be spoilers for Winter’s Tale throughout this post.  That is only the nature of the beast when I write a post like this.  Do not get up in arms if I ruin the story of Winter’s Tale for you.  I warned you.  I was fair.  If you continue reading past this point, getting spoiled is your own fault.

Alright.  The following many points are some of the crazy things that happen throughout Winter’s Tale.  They help to set the movie apart from the many other movies that get released on a weekly basis.  The movie as a whole is an experience that needs to be had.  If you have not seen it, stop reading this right now and then come back to this post after having watched the movie.  Or read this post then watch the movie.  Either way, you need to watch the movie.  And here are some reasons why:

1. The movie begins with a husband, wife, and baby who sound eastern European.  They are turned away from America because the husband has a disease.  As they head back to Europe, the parents put the child on a tiny little toy boat and push him back toward America.  This child somehow survives and grows up to become Colin Farrell.
2. Adult Peter Lake has an Irish accent for some reason.  Most of the people in America in the 1910s, when the movie mostly takes place, have American accents of some sort.  Peter Lake grew up in America around Americans and yet somehow ended up with an Irish accent.  There is no explanation as to why that is the case.  It just is.
3. The movie is about love but it is also about miracles.  It is about how everybody has a miracle within them and that the miracle will eventually manifest in one way or another.  The miracle that Beverly Penn gives is immortality to Peter Lake.  This means that though the majority of the film takes place in the 1910s, Peter Lake can end up in 2014 at the same exact age he was before.  The miracle that Peter Lake can give is resurrection.  He brings a little girl back from death.  Yep.  That’s what I said.  She comes back to life after dying because Peter Lake cries on her and resurrects her.
4. There is a flying horse in this movie.  Pearly Soames calls it a dog during the movie but it is really a horse.  It helps Peter Lake to escape Pearly’s men multiple times throughout the movie.  The men trap Peter Lake and are about to stab him.  Do they?  No.  He finds the horse and rides into the sky above them.  The men are about to attack Beverly.  Do they?  No.  Peter shows up with his flying horse, gets her, and flies away with her.  A girl is dying and Pearly is coming back again.  What happens?  Peter puts the girl on the horse and flies to a remote house to bring her back to life.  Then at the end of the movie, he flies into outer space with the horse.  Yeah.
5. Did I mention that Pearly Soames is a demon?  No?  Well, he’s a demon.  And he really wants to stop Peter Lake from performing a miracle.  He wants to break rules to do it so he must go to his boss, Lucifer (Will Smith) for permission.  I’ve got nothing more on that point, really.
6. Beverly gets poisoned with some poison that will only affect her if she gets excited.  Of course, she doesn’t know that she has been poisoned when she bones Peter Lake.  She dies as she climaxes.  Peter Lake tries to resurrect her, but she is not the person he is supposed to give his miracle to.  It does end with him having immortality though.
7. In the first of two fights between Peter Lake and Pearly Soames, Pearly kicks Peter’s ass and throws him off of a bridge.  He does not check to make sure that Peter is dead.  He assumes it and ends up making an ass out of himself later on.  Peter ends up being alive, with amnesia.  For one hundred years, he cannot remember who he is.  And he does not find it strange that he does not age at all.
8. Beverly Penn has a little sister who is about ten or so years old during the 1910s when the majority of the film takes place.  When Peter figures out who he is in 2014, he ends up running into the sister again.  The sister would be over 100 years old at the time and should be frail.  Yet she is personally running a newspaper and running around doing the work.  She also looks like an 80-something year old woman because she is played by Eva Marie Saint who is only very recently 90 years old.  There is a fifteen or twenty year age difference between actress and character.  The character who shouldn’t even be alive for Peter Lake to find in 2014.
9. In the second fight between Peter Lake and Pearly Soames, Peter Lake ends up winning.  He stabs Pearly with a piece of metal and Pearly turns into a snowman.  You hear that?  He turns into a snowman.  Pearly becomes snow Pearly.  Why?  It is never explained.  Never.  Not once.

That is a lot of crazy stuff that was going on in Winter’s Tale.  There is probably a whole lot more that I haven’t even mentioned here.  But what I did mention is a lot of the wackier stuff that stuck in my mind and helped make watching the movie into one of the most unique experiences that I have had in a while.

You owe it to yourself to check out Winter’s Tale.  Is it sappy and overly romantic?  Sure it is.  But it also has a lot of odd little moments in it that make it into one of the strangest romantic films out there.  It is a movie that needs to be seen if only to know the truth of what I have written throughout this post.  It is a movie that needs to be seen for the experience.  It is a movie that needs to be seen.

And here are a few notes that need to be read:

• I mentioned how this post is similar to one I wrote for Howard the Duck, so I thought I would link to that post.
• An actor named Roman Blat appeared in Winter’s Tale.  He was also in the movie New Year’s Eve, which was covered around this past New Year’s Eve.
• Have you seen Winter’s Tale?  What did you think of it?  Do you know any other big budget movies that are as ridiculous as Winter’s Tale?  Give your thoughts in the comments.
• If you have a movie that you want me to watch as part of the Sunday “Bad” Movies, put that suggestion in the comments.  Or you could find me on Twitter and tell me there.