Stardust is an unfortunate mess that wants so terribly to be a great pop epic but was settle for being a B-movie with a lot of razzle-dazzle and very little soul. The problem here is that nothing feels original, it's like a bouillabaisse of ever fantasy tenant in history. Unicorns, witches, gay pirates, magic wishes, hocus pocus, flying shps, royal ghosts, swordfights... you name it's all here.

Problem is it's all entirely like we've seen it before. Like that pirate ship, seems just like the one that became the hat (ingenious) from Time Bandits. Oh, how about how a certain character is blown into thousands of fiery rocks (don't touch it, it's eeeevil!).

Secondly, the world that's created makes up its own rules as it goes along, so there's no real rhyme or reason at play to define it. It also struck me how effectively LOTR created it's physical world, so you always knew where the heroes were going and where their journey took them. Here it makes no sense. The pirates pick up our heroes and take them on a 3 day pleasure cruise (2 days of which is all it takes to become a master swordsmen) before finally getting them where they need to be in time.

It's just all too much and not enough to hold it together. If the heroes were more compelling and their arc stronger they could have done it, but these leads are pure vanilla and emote nothing for their characters or their audience.

Matthew Vaughn is clearly a talented director, but fantasy is not his game. He tries to make it a huge epic, when a simple inexpensive story is all this needs.