What do miracles, flying horses, gangs, tuberculosis and Will Smith have in common?

They all make appearances in the movie adaptation of “Winter’s Tale” of the 1983 book by Mark Helprin. Released on Valentines’ Day, the movie only brought in $8.1 million over Presidents’ Day weekend, despite its $60 million budget.

The movie jumps around a lot, so stay with me. “Winter’s Tale” kicks off in present day New York. An unnamed man (Collin Farrell) is looking into a box containing seemingly random, unrelated objects. Flashback to the late 1800’s, where the viewer sees two immigrants being sent back to Ireland. Before leaving, they place their infant son Peter Lake on a small boat, and in the process it is revealed this baby is the man from before.

Pearly Soames (Russell Crowe), someone who works for the mysterious dark side, finds Peter. Over the course of 21 years, Pearly raises Peter to be a murderous thief, but as Peter grows up, he tries not to be violent. As a grown man, Peter confronts Pearly about his cruel ways and leaves the “dark side” on a white, winged stallion.

Peter takes the horse and uses it to ride to a mysterious, deserted mansion. He attempts to rob it, but instead ends up having tea with the red-headed Beverly (Jessica Brown Finlay). Just as their instant love begins, Beverly reveals that she’s dying from tuberculosis.

Meanwhile, Pearly goes to the leader of the dark side to request permission to pursue Peter. The leader is revealed to be Lucifer, who is revealed to be… Will Smith? Nobody explains why Peter is so important, only saying that he is destined to perform a miracle. The movie continues, elaborating on the love story between Beverley and Peter. I don’t want to give away the end, but a series of events result in Peter drawing a picture of a red haired girl on a sidewalk in present day New York.

Confused yet? You’re not alone.

“Winter’s Tale” continues with a fight scene finale, and a pony ride into the heavens. In the interest of not ruining the plot, I won’t give away the twist ending. But there are so many problems with this movie I’m not sure where to start.

The movie is extremely confusing. I read the literary counterpart prior to seeing the silver screen version, so I understood the plot. But the friend I went with was constantly confused.

To the casual moviegoer, “Winter’s Tale” just seems jumbled with too much time spent on  side storylines that were stuck together by cheesy, irrelevant quotes about miracles and the heavens, sprinkled with magic. The surprise ending doesn’t have much of an effect because nobody understands what’s going on in the first place.

Fans of the book will be disappointed  by the lack of details and the action scenes the director chose to keep in the movie. Granted, the book version is very long. But the movie cut out so much of story, rendering it difficult to follow. To make up for the confusion, it seems directors chose to overdo the romance and action, which will make even hardcore fans cringe at times.

This movie is not worth the money, unless you’re a die-hard Helprin fan who wants to see how badly the story was butchered.