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RATING:   
A plucky but willful Abigail Breslin, a cute array of animal friends who exude human behaviour, Jodie Foster attempting to flex her dusty old comic muscles and the yummy but useless Gerard Butler as a lost-at-sea Dad — all wrapped up in a Swiss Family Robinson package complete with a Home Alone greeting card — make Nim's Island a perfectly innocuous kiddy adventure that is part well-intentioned fantasy story, part yawn-fest.
This safari tour for tweens is boringly safe and formulaic, save for the occasional laugh-out-loud moment and splendidly lush island/playground. Because of (or sometimes in spite of) the alternating hit-and-miss performance of Breslin (as the mostly delightful Nim) and an over-acting Foster (as the slapstick-campy Alexandra Rover), you wonder if the film's message mantra about the need to be the hero of one's own life story, successfully filters through to a mildly-engaged audience.
While the film will most certainly tickle the funny bones of those below nine and might even appeal to some pre-teens, this big budget kiddie project strangely lacks the whimsical charm it shows only glimpses of throughout the film, and never quite rises to its potential of being enchanting.
Sadly, the only one mystifying component you come away with is wonderment of how a remote island — which is almost impossible to find in the South Pacific — can have such constant high-speed Internet connection that lasts through tornados and other natural disasters. - TODAY/sh
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