Another film that my alphabetical trawl through Disney Plus saw me land on was "A Ring of Endless Light" a Disney Channel TV movie from 2002 starring young Mischa Barton and Jared Padalecki before their respective TV shows would make them stars.
Vicky Austin (Mischa Barton) heads for a summer with her grandfather (James Whitmore) along with her younger siblings, child genius Suzy (Scarlett Pomers) and Bug obsessed Rob (Soren Fulton). Her grandfather lives on an island that has a Dolphin research facility which she's invited to by Adam (Ryan Merriman) who works there. Vicky has an instant kinship with the dolphins, to the point that she seems to be able to understand what they are saying.
It was interesting to read in the other reviews that this is a poor adaptation of an apparently well-liked book. For the record, I didn't even know this was a book prior to watch it and can happily report that it stands as a terrible movie all on its own merits. Some people have laid blame on Mischa Barton's performance, which I feel is pretty harsh as she's just 16 at the time, and the movie IS ABOUT A GIRL WHO CAN TALK TO DOLPHINS ! It's a pretty ridiculous premise, that's padded out with a dull love triangle and an earnest but tedious ecological message.
It's a bad film because it's a cheaply made TV movie, the dolphin interaction is minimal and is often increased by badly merging stock footage of dolphins around the kids. I appreciate that I'm not the target audience, but it was so boring it was the first time going through the movies on Disney Plus that I thought I wouldn't make it to the end.
Horrible.
Vicky Austin (Mischa Barton) heads for a summer with her grandfather (James Whitmore) along with her younger siblings, child genius Suzy (Scarlett Pomers) and Bug obsessed Rob (Soren Fulton). Her grandfather lives on an island that has a Dolphin research facility which she's invited to by Adam (Ryan Merriman) who works there. Vicky has an instant kinship with the dolphins, to the point that she seems to be able to understand what they are saying.
It was interesting to read in the other reviews that this is a poor adaptation of an apparently well-liked book. For the record, I didn't even know this was a book prior to watch it and can happily report that it stands as a terrible movie all on its own merits. Some people have laid blame on Mischa Barton's performance, which I feel is pretty harsh as she's just 16 at the time, and the movie IS ABOUT A GIRL WHO CAN TALK TO DOLPHINS ! It's a pretty ridiculous premise, that's padded out with a dull love triangle and an earnest but tedious ecological message.
It's a bad film because it's a cheaply made TV movie, the dolphin interaction is minimal and is often increased by badly merging stock footage of dolphins around the kids. I appreciate that I'm not the target audience, but it was so boring it was the first time going through the movies on Disney Plus that I thought I wouldn't make it to the end.
Horrible.