“Race to Witch Mountain” is not only based on a book, but it’s a “re-working” of the 1975 movie, “Escape to Witch Mountain”.
Dwayne (“Don’t Call Me The Rock Anymore”) Johnson stars as a taxi driver who helps a pair of teenage space aliens, who look like humans, try to get their spaceship back after they crash land near Las Vegas. The aliens need to return to their planet to stop their army from coming to Earth and taking over our planet.
The plot is very simple. In fact, so is the entire movie.
The acting is pretty bad. This is Johnson’s second family film for Disney, following 2007’s “The Game Plan”. Neither script gave him much to work with. AnnaSophia Robb plays the alien girl and newcomer Alexander Ludwig play her brother. Both talk and act like we think aliens should talk and act, but it’s too bad we don’t get to see what they look like as aliens.
I also wish there were a few twists in the story, but there aren’t. And a few attempts at humor fail miserably. There are loads of car chases and explosions but no great special effects, even with the space ship.
“Race to Witch Mountain” is rated PG, because of action-violence involving guns and a semi-frightening space creature. However, I think younger kids (ages 6-9) will like the movie a lot more than older viewers, who will likely find it boring.
On The Official Kid Critic Report Card, “Race to Witch Mountain” gets a C. No reason to race to the video store or VOD to check it out.
A bit of a disappointment, but I didn’t really have high hopes for it anyway.