The movie world’s most courteous bear is back! I’ve been a huge fan of the Paddington movies, and filmmaker Paul King pulled off something pretty unique with movie franchises by actually making the sequel even better than the original. So I was a tad worried that King passed the torch to Dougal Wilson, though he’s still involved as an executive producer.  Still, I kept an open mind as most of the cast is still intact, especially Ben Whishaw as Paddington’s voice, I really can’t imagine anyone else voicing the amiable bear.

As this is set up in Paddington’s origin story, we first see him as a cub on a Peruvian mountain trying to grab an orange from a tree. He falls into the river, and as we’ve seen in the first movie, he gets rescued by his adopted parents, Uncle Pastuzo and Aunt Lucy (Imelda Staunton).  By now, Aunt Lucy has moved to a Home of Retired Bears in Peru. Cue a musical number with Olivia Colman as Reverend Mother, complete with an homage to The Sound of Music (there are more nods to popular movies later). The Paddington movies seem to have a thing with nuns, as I recall Hugh Grant‘s Phoenix Buchanan’s disguise as one in Paddington 2. Grant also has a brief cameo here in the post-credit scene.

Upon receiving a letter from Aunt Lucy, Paddington decides to visit her, with the entire Brown family in tow of course. It’s awesome that Paddington is now officially a Brit, and he even got his own passport to travel abroad. Mr. Brown (Hugh Bonneville) is inspired to take great risks thanks to his new boss ( Hayley Atwell in a brief cameo) and the parachute-through-the-office-window scene is an obvious nod to Mission Impossible. Emily Mortimer (replacing Sally Hawkins as Mrs. Brown) is happy that the family is spending time together again.

The rest of the movie turns into a jungle [mis]adventure to find Aunt Lucy who suddenly goes missing, and at one point the Browns have to trek through the jungle on foot. Of course, this is a kids’ movie so the Amazonian Rainforest looks pretty tame and safe, nothing like the scary jungle in Peter Jackson’s King Kong. There’s a subplot involving a Spanish treasure hunter aptly named Hunter Cabot (Antonio Banderas) and his daughter Gina (Carla Tous). Hunter is obsessed with finding lost Spanish gold, which he thinks is in the mythical city of El Dorado. Banderas embraces his comic chops once more, it’s as if he’s playing a live-action version of Puss in Boot here.

All the scenes of him talking to the ghosts of his ancestors (all played by Banderas) are amusing but get a bit repetitive. There’s also a mystery involving the retirement home, which the Brown’s housekeeper Mrs. Bird (Julie Walters) finds extremely suspicious. There are some droll moments to be found in these storylines, but I feel that the most hilarious and charming scenes involve Paddington’s day-in-the-life shenanigans, such as Paddington in the photo booth and him trying to get into a hammock. The riotous scene at the barber in Paddington 2 still had me in stitches!

Thus, the movie’s weakest moments are when they stray away from Paddington or even the Brown family. I honestly don’t really care about Cabot’s ancestors, and I feel that the Cabot ghosts take up too much screen time. The heartwarming spirit and witty humor get lost a bit in all the jungle adventure, but fortunately, writers Mark Burton, Jon Foster, and James Lamont manage to find their way back. Burton is the writer of the excellent Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl which has a clever espionage mystery.

Wilson keeps the pacing quite sprightly and his tributes to iconic movies like Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark and Mary Poppins are pretty fun. The script weaves in the rich Incan mythology and sacred archaeological sites, and it really resonates with me as Paddington goes through his own journey as an immigrant in the end. Aunt Lucy’s words reflect his quest for self-discovery, reshaping his identity, and figuring out he truly belongs.

All in all, Paddington in Peru is still a wonderfully enjoyable family movie. While the most charming cinematic bear gets a bit off course in the wieldy jungle adventure, he still packs a lot of charm.

Have you seen Paddington 3? What do you think of the Paddington movies?