Kit Kittredge: An American Girl

Rozema and her spry cast prove that they don't have to haunt in order to involve youngsters and adults in a rich tale of adversity, hope and, yes, gumption.

One of the 10 best American movies released so far this year, Kit Kittredge: An American Girl is the surprisingly satisfying first theatrical film inspired by a long-running series of historically themed dolls.

We follow a surprisingly clever mystery. We get the nostalgic thrill of hearing someone holler, "He's taking the loot!" We marvel over magic tricks. And we meet a whole bunch of lovable characters who, we hope, have more stories to tell.

Based on the highly popular American Girl book series, Kit plays out like a sweet-souled Nancy Drew mystery.

This tale of a little girl's determination and grit during the Depression is an honest-to-goodness family movie, one that parents and children can enjoy equally and together.

Like the dolls, the movie is beautifully crafted and hugely appealing. Kit Kittredge: An American Girl is a simple case of a good story, well told.

A smart, playful, informative pleasure in its own right — a gently thoughtful, audience-appropriate entertainment that assembles swell actors to play colorful characters who don't shy away from depicting serious hard times.

Kit is sweet without being sappy, cute without being cloying.

A refreshingly old-fashioned entertainment proving Hollywood actually can make movies like it used to.

The film is warm and foursquare, pleasingly honest about its timeworn emotions. The Great Depression it shows us is sugar-coated but only mildly so, which is to say it's seen through the clear, optimistic eyes of a 10-year-old.

Rozema confronts issues of race, sex and politics without characters who are racist, sexist or overtly political.

A thoroughly satisfying and engaging children's picture that never forgets those kids probably didn't get to the theater by themselves.

Kit Kittredge is a broadly drawn map encouraging tolerance, charity, volunteerism, empathy and compassion, in a spoonful-of-sugar way that is more fun than those words sound.

With a dash of realism and more than a little intelligence, Kit Kittredge becomes a kiddie film that's worth an adult ticket, too.

This is a beautifully directed, smart movie with good messages, gentle humor and a sense of history, but it never feels like homework -- it is good and good for you.

Sweet, old-fashioned and sentimental to a fault, Kit Kittredge: An American Girl is Nancy Drew with training wheels.

It's a delightful surprise that Kit Kittredge: An American Girl, an adventure inspired by the popular doll line, is a sprightly and entertaining film.

Kit bursts out of her box and onto the big screen. The movie named for her is surprisingly solid and entertaining, considering that it started life as a doll, and mostly avoids the saccharine.

In a summer filled with superheroes, special effects and Sex and the City stilettos, it's downright refreshing to review a movie whose most audacious effect is Abigail Breslin donning a wee cloche hat.

Kit Kittredge doesn't at all pander to pint-sized doll aficionados. Rather, the movie is smart, empathetic, fun loving and, best of all, a delight for all audiences.

It's fun, fast-paced, educational entertainment that's fit for the whole family -- American boys included.

A better-than-necessary spin-off of the doll franchise, carried by Breslin and a first-rate bunch of second bananas.

With a talented cast of humans, Kit Kittredge: An American Girl turns out to be a nice surprise, a solidly constructed and colorfully detailed gift to the family audience.

Kit Kittredge makes a wonderful summer outing for grandmothers, moms and daughters -- and the boys they invite along.

It can't quite decide whether it wants to be a mystery or a heartfelt family drama, sometimes moves at a snail's pace and is undeniably predictable.

Kit Kittredge: An American Girl has its heart in the right place and its head shoved well down into a box of clichés.

This is not a movie that will appeal equally to adults and children. Kit is strictly a kids' movie -- brimming with easy-to-swallow life lessons.

The film's social consciousness -- would be more interesting if Kit Kittredge weren't photographed in the amber glow we associate with Kodak commercials and other happily-ever-after exercises in nostalgia.

This Great Depression-era period piece tries so hard to make a point that it becomes overwhelmingly earnest at times. And that explains why its later attempts at comedy are so broad and goofy.

Kit Kittredge is a harmless, old-fashioned, very G-rated family film. In this case, though, the "G" stands for girls only.

Kit Kittredge: An American Girl teaches by entertaining example as it brings history to life for young viewers.

Because there are precious fewer films where the focus is on young women, I don't want to harsh on a film made with obvious love and respect. Still, this underserved audience deserves better.

Director Patricia Rozema and writer Ann Peacock have made a movie that might prompt you to say, with either admiration or astonishment, "They don't make 'em like that anymore."

There's no getting around the fact that the cast of Little House on the Prairie might have balked at the awkwardly contrived finish.

The film's light script has the proverbial heartstrings in permanent tug mode.

Though predictable and unabashedly sentimental, the film is a warmly appealing tale of a bright girl bravely navigating tough times.

I have no argument with the theme of empowerment aimed at an audience of girls. I do, however, take exception to a plot that is banal and predictable and performances that run the gamut from just OK to risible.

What starts as a charming slice-of-life tale of the strength of the human spirit becomes a bad episode of the Scooby-Doo Mysteries. Why it took that course is the real mystery.

The movie is like a 1930s or 1940s short about Americans pulling together, stretched out to feature length.

Most adults in the audience will probably go along with this homespun if rose-colored view of the not-so-distant past in which every one of the hobos living in the “Hobo Jungle” on the outskirts of the city seem kindly, well-educated, selfless, caring folk.

Considering director Rozema previously made the revisionist Mansfield Park, one rather hoped she might have been equally ingenious with the considerably less worthy material here.

Kit Kittredge feels like one of those well meaning movies they show as part of a presentation at our nation's numerous national parks.