The Spiderwick Chronicles (PG) *** | Fantasy full of magical charm

BY RENE RODRIGUEZ

rrodriguez@MiamiHerald.com

At a time when too many children's fantasy films are weighed down by their bloated self-importance and bombast, The Spiderwick Chronicles is a refreshingly spry, modest adventure: It's pocket-size where The Golden Compass and The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe felt like encyclopedias.

Even though Spiderwick shares many elements with those other two pictures -- alternate universes, dysfunctional family relations, magic and monsters and life-and-death battles -- there isn't a scene in it in which you're aware of the labor and effort behind it.The movie is funny and scary and touching in all the ways the best children's pictures are, but it is also fast and compact, running a perfectly paced 93 minutes (including credits).

It also happens to be pretty wonderful -- the kind of rare family film for which the gimmicky term ''Fun for all ages!'' was invented. The phrase genuinely applies to this adaptation of the books by Tony DiTerlizzi and Holly Black, which dusted off archetypal fantasy creatures -- fairies, goblins and trolls -- and presented them with reenergized vigor and wit.

The script, by Karey Kirkpatrick, David Berenbaum and John Sayles, sticks to the same formula. Taken on their own, the individual elements may sound woefully familiar: An old, possibly haunted house filled with secret nooks and passages; a trio of siblings, twin brothers (both played by Freddie Highmore) and their older sister (Sarah Bolger), who bicker relentlessly and pine for their absent father (Andrew McCarthy) while their beleaguered mom (Mary-Louise Parker) struggles to raise them; and a magical book, discovered by the brasher of the two boys, that contains spells and rules that would allow a hulking goblin, Mulgarath (Nick Nolte), to enslave the human race.

The movie essentially follows the attempt by Mulgarath and his goblin underlings to steal the book from the kids, who fight back in ingenious ways. In his first foray into otherworldly fantasy, director Mark Waters (Mean Girls, Just Like Heaven), paces the movie gradually, using special effects sparingly to ease the viewer into the Spiderwick universe along with his characters.

Those characters are well-rendered by the cast, which includes David Strathairn as the author of the tome that causes all the trouble and Joan Plowright as his aged daughter. The two actors have some surprisingly moving scenes, a testament to how well The Spiderwick Chronicles works even when there are no green horned beasties onscreen. But it is ultimately those beasties, of course -- including a magnificent griffin, a honey-addicted brownie (voiced by Martin Short) and a portly goblin (voiced by Seth Rogen) with an unsatiable appetite for birds -- that make the movie so transporting. There are sequences in The Spiderwick Chronicles -- usually those in which the fantasy world intersects with the real world -- that are absolutely thrilling, filled with the kind of excitement that most family films rarely achieve. It's a genuine wonder.

Cast: Freddie Highmore, Sarah Bolger, Mary-Louise Parker, David Strathairn, Joan Plowright, Nick Nolte, Andrew McCarthy; voices of Seth Rogen and Martin Short

Director: Mark Waters

Screenwriters: Karey Kirkpatrick, David Berenbaum, John Sayles. Based on the books by Tony DiTerlizzi and Holly Black

Producers: Mark Canton, Larry Franco, Ellen Goldsmith-Vein

A Paramount Pictures release. Running time: 93 minutes. Brief goblin violence, scary moments. Playing at area theaters. Also showing in IMAX format at the Autonation IMAX Theater at the Museum of Discovery and Science in Fort Lauderdale.