Did we... did we just like that?

Finally, a movie that we really, actually enjoyed. Instead of having to pick up and dust off certain elements of a movie in order to justify our four bucks, we can honestly say that Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events is an unequivocal success.

The script is polished and unique, with a wicked satiric edge. The writer managed to nail the particular blend of the fantastical and macabre that characterizes the best children's stories. The art director deserves an award for the brilliant costumes and the score is perfect, accentuating the mood in every scene.

Emily Browning (Violet Baudelaire) is a frighteningly talented young actor with a quiet charisma that neatly balanced the always-manic Carrey (Count Olaf). Liam Aiken (Klaus Baudelaire) is eminently watchable, the Hoffman twins are great babies (yes, I'm complimeting the acting skills of a toddler) and even Jude Law's narration is noteworthy. Billy Connolly briefly makes us forget... well, half his career... during an extended cameo as the charming, irascible Uncle Monty and Meryl Streep's turn as shell-of-her-former-self Aunt Josephine is both farcical and haunting.

Directed by Brad Silberling, the movie has a poetry all of its own: although the story bears more resemblance to a fairy tale than reality, there's never a sense of being overwhelmed by the fantastical elements. Each piece locks into the next and the resulting assembly is an absorbing, immersive tragicomedy.