When a movie preview is awe-inspiring, you expect the movie to be nothing less.

“Monster’s Ball” director Marc Forster’s “Finding Neverland” proves to be better as a trailer than as an actual film.

Johnny Depp (“Secret Window”) stars in this movie as J.M Barrie, the famous writer of the play “Peter Pan.” When one of his plays flops in theatres, he tells his producer that a masterpiece is on the way, and he goes out to the park in search of inspiration.

Instead of inspiration he finds widower Sylvia Llewelyn Davies and her four sons: Jack, George, Peter and Michael. Barrie becomes imagination incarnate for the boys, whose father died of jaw cancer. Sylvia (Kate Winslet, “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind”) wants nothing more than for her sons to return to a normal life, as it was before her husband passed away.

Barrie creates a world for the boys, one that Peter finds hard to believe, as he is forced to grow up faster than his childhood would allow due to his father’s untimely death. Barrie motivates Peter to begin writing in order to channel his lost childhood. In doing so, Barrie discovers within his masterpiece the boys and creates “Peter Pan” around the adventures the five of them have together.

Throughout his adventures, his integrity is questioned, why he has been spending so much time with a woman other than his wife and why he would want to spend so much time with children. Barrie must confront these accusations and figure out what his intentions really are, when he discovers that Mrs. Davies is not in the best health and her mother (Julie Christie, “Doctor Zhivago”) is trying to make sure that Mrs. Davies finds a man to replace her husband quickly.

While the film may make the lighthearted shed a tear or two, it doesn’t mean it’s all that captivating. The music that was in the preview does not seem to appear in the film, which greatly decreases any enlightening feelings. The music is, in fact, quite scarce, giving the film a much more serious feeling. What music there is in the film is soft, sparse in instrumentation and very much in the background.

Depp and Winslett’s performances, however, are captivating. Together, even though their relationship is questionable, they have quite the chemistry. Whether or not they are romantically involved doesn’t really matter because the two work together as though they have been a team for years, with a mellow but fluid interaction.

While the children are featured in the film, they are certainly not a major focus. They make the film easier to watch, however, with their cute factors, especially Peter’s character, played by Freddie Highmore (“Two Brothers”). Not only is he adorable, but also he is believable in his anger, frustration and disbelief at the world that Barrie tries to invent for him and his brothers. He shows his emotions in a very real way, not overly exaggerated but not hard to find beneath his attractiveness either.

The film is not a complete bust. It is inspired by true events and so makes those in the audience question whether or not the whole of it is true or if it was loosely based on some facts. It is surprising that Depp would choose a role that is so predictable and sappy. His performance, along with his co-star Winslett, are what keeps the film moving, not the storyline itself, which is stretched too far too many times.

The cinematography is foreseeable; where it is trying to be inventive it turns out to be repetitive and sloppy. The filmmakers, it seems, were trying to create the world that Barrie saw in his head, only to make it seem like they are cutting and pasting together odd scenes in an otherwise normal movie. Maybe they should have thought a little longer about how to integrate his thoughts with the very real world he lived in.

Grade: C