"Pan bombing," "Pan panned," "Pan should walk the plank."

They're all out there, some pun-heavy, others just plain ruthless, but they all agree on one thing: the new Peter Pan prequel Pan is a filmic failure.

So apparently bad is the film starring Australia's own Hugh Jackman, the New York Post gave it zero stars.

"It's got a script that jams in random elements from other blockbuster franchises...a uniformly charmless cast headed by Hugh Jackman, each of whom seems to be performing in a different film," said Lou Lumenick in his review for the New York Post.

"All directed by Joe Wright, an expert at literary adaptations who turns out to be utterly tone-deaf when it comes to fantasy."

Over at online film review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, Pan was given a "Tomatometer rating" by top critics of 18 per cent.

The Tomatometer rating is based on the published opinions of hundreds of film and television critics. The percentage represents the professional critic reviews that are positive.

Pan is the prequel to the Peter Pan tale that is already known and loved. It takes the orphan to World War II London, where he falls under the hand of Blackbeard (Jackman) who is digging for pixie dust.

Blackbeard soon reveals to Peter, played by Australian Levi Miller, that he is the "chosen one," and Peter proceeds to escape.

Susan Wloszczyna at RogerEbert.com gave a similarly poor review of the film, writing, "Every once in a while, a movie comes along that is so punishing to one's mental and physical being that the narrative should be divided into rounds instead of acts."

However, trawl the internet long enough and a few positive words on the film can be found - sort of.

Josh Dickey at Mashable Australia described the film as so bad that "you should absolutely leave the house this weekend and pay good money to see it ."

"Pan is...its own thing: a visually disgusting, audibly loud and obnoxious, narratively incoherent attempt at a Hollywood adventure blockbuster. And it is glorious."

Pan has been showing in Australia since late September, when Fairfax Media film and arts writer Phillippa Hawker gave it two and a half stars, describing the film as an eventual "3D thrill ride, with a lot of falling through space and flying pirate ships lurching here and there, for no obvious reason."

The performance of the film is a likely disappointment for Warner Bros. With openings at 3515 locations and a price tag of $US150 million, projections are only in the low $US20 millions.

Pan also stars Rooney Mara, Gerrett Hedlund and Amanda Seyfried. It is currently showing in cinemas.