Paddington Bear returns and still has a lot to learn.
Warner Bros. has released a full-length US trailer for Paddington 2 ahead of the film’s January release and it’s a heartwarming, if rather busy, reintroduction to Paddington Bear’s adventures around the streets of London. The Paddington sequel sees the iconic anthropomorphic bear getting used to life with the Browns and finding a job, among other shenanigans. Watch it below.
Following up the 2014 surprise hit, Paddington 2 stars the impeccable voice talents of Ben Whishaw as the eponymous bear alongside Hugh Bonneville, Sally Hawkins and Jim Broadbent in live-action. Here is the official synopsis of the film: “While searching for the perfect present for his beloved Aunt Lucy’s hundredth birthday, Paddington sees a unique pop-up book in Mr. Gruber’s antique shop, and embarks upon a series of odd jobs to buy it. But when the book is stolen, it’s up to Paddington and the Browns to unmask the thief.”
That entire plot summary essentially plays itself out in the trailer but with a decent helping of the ridiculous humor that characterized the first film. As Emily Estep wrote in her review, “The warm and gooey family scenes are abundant in Paddington, but they are wonderfully paired with bizarre little comedy bits and off-the-wall styling.” The absolute absurdity of watching a talking bear hop on a bicycle and cleaning windows in the new trailer is one thing, but of course, Paddington somehow ends up getting arrested for theft and dyeing every inmate’s laundry pink by accident. “I’ve really got to grips with how things work,” Paddington says, amusingly enough. It’s these juxtapositions that make for an engaging trailer. There is also an inkling of the more fantastical elements that make Paddington so indulgently good as a family film, such as the character quite literally entering the world of the pop-up book in Mr. Gruber’s shop.
But as with many trailers nowadays, this one suffers from the sheer amount of information. We come out of the trailer left with only a missing ending, yet another movie has been reduced to two minutes and thirty seconds in the process. But at least Paddington 2 doesn’t have to convince anyone that its premise will actually work. Furthermore, given the ludicrous nature of the story in general, perhaps the film will still have some tricks up its sleeve come opening day.
Paddington 2 has had a rocky couple of months before it finally parted ways with old distributor TWC in a smart move to distance itself from the company’s now-seedy reputation. “It is deeply frustrating that a film made with such love and care and a character of such positive and generous spirit might, in some way, be tarnished with the brush of these horrific, wholly unacceptable, acts,” said a source close to co-producer Heyday Films earlier this month. Warner Bros., which has distributed other Heyday productions in the past, picked up Paddington 2‘s distribution rights for $32 million.
Catch Paddington 2 domestically on January 12, 2018.