Call it a personal feeling of mine, but I thought Too Old for Fairy Tales by Netflix, a below average Polish film on this topic didn’t really need a sequel. Again, you cannot come of age twice can you? But if at all it was to be made, there were more appropriate names like 2 Old For Fairytales that could have been chosen. That is what I call an opportunity wasted.
Here we are though with a worse title and another sequel and the film is pretty much the same quality as the first. However, though less dark because nobody dies in this one either; still some serious topics are touched on here and there amidst an inevitable series of events.
Just in case you’ve forgotten, let me remind you: The first movie was about Waldek (Maciej Karas) an addict gamer who got out of behind his laptop screen only when he realized he might lose his mother Teresa (Karolina Gruszka).
The second movie has happier start than this one. Teresa is not dying anymore yet Waldek together with Staszek and Delfina go with their boyfriends Piotr and Aunt Mariola (Dorota Kolak) respectively to Tatra Mountains where they will partake in different village activities mostly ending up being attacked by animals.
See? Happier. But a bit of a pall is cast over proceedings when Waldek and Staszek set out to find Waldi’s biological father, who apparently lives nearby, leaving Delfina behind to run interference. In fact throughout most of the movie circumstances conspired to keep characters in isolated pairs: Piotr & Mariola pair off against each other while Waldi goes into hiding with Staszek rather than face his girlfriend.
There’s almost nothing interesting happening here. Just from looking at the outline itself one can already predict how everything will unfold mentioning especially meeting Waldi’s father Krzysztof (Michal Zurawski) and discovering him to be a rich computer game creator who lives alone in secrecy like a cool James Bond villain.
This is another case of an idea that was done much better in the previous film. And at least, one can say that Too Old For Fairy Tales 2 has good-natured characters. Waldi’s interaction with Delfina and Staszek, Piotr as the affectionate, dim-witted dad trying to keep up with them using wrong Urban Dictionary phrases or gestures sometimes, exemplifies all this warmth between Teresa and Mariola.
But it’s a small consolation for such a dry screenplay which flits between arch slapstick nonsense. Waldi and Staszek being chased by a bear, say and earnest sentiment which doesn’t always feel earned. As likable as the characters are there’s nothing distinct about them, so there’s nothing to latch onto. We can see what’s coming a mile away.
Forget about themes or any historical information; however, even this does not make it more captivating. This title as well as the name of its predecessor is somehow ironic, they show how little boys come back to reality realizing they cannot expect fairy-tale resolutions for their issues anymore but only need practical ones.
This idea is a bit more followed up by Too Old for Fairy Tales 2, because it lacks the element of escaping prison as in the first movie where Teresa’s health troubles achieved that. This movie makes Waldi know more about himself, his friends and family, which is good but not enough reason for making this sequel in the first place.
There is also again, like in the first movie a running theme of gaming all through, however, it is tokenized more often. In the first movie, Waldi’s passion for video games symbolized his unwillingness to face reality; anticipation of the climactic tournament at the end of the initial installment was a moment of catharsis for him and his pals.
In Too Old For Fairy Tales 2, they give their laptops to Mariola when they arrive at her place and never use them again. Also Krzysztof’s area of expertise and main focus of his mercilessness within it shows that gaming may be seen negatively throughout art form thus giving an unexpectedly negative meaning that does not match with how gaming was depicted in the previous film.
Forgive me if I digress here but am desperately searching for something positive in such a nice yet thoroughly cliché follow-up to a story that didn’t need another one in its existence or justify its production. Maybe that sentence sums it all up!
Watch Too Old for Fairy Tales 2 For Free On Putlocker.