FairyTale – A True Story

One of two 1997 films inspired by Elsie Wright and Frances Griffiths' photographs of the fairies resident at the bottom of their Cottingley garden. While Nick Willing's Photographing Fairies used the hullabaloo surrounding the pics to spin a distinctly ambivalent, adult story about bereavement, imagined realities and the post-WWI national psyche, Sturridge's film takes up the same issues in the children's film format, proclaims a whole hearted, affirmative response to the Fairy Question, and induces a more ambiguous reaction. Despite the high production values, however, the glitzy cast and several tried-and-tested storytellers, I never truly believed that the film-makers believed. Children, on the other hand, may not be so cynical. It's a respectable tale, but there's too much baggage for the fancy fully to take flight.