Cast
I love both Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock.That alone should be able to get me hooked. Tom Hank was underused. Sandra Bullock was misused till the end. I need to see the kid in another movie, because I can't tell whether he is a weak actor playing an vaguely autistic boy or accomplished child actor pulling off an honest depiction of autism.I guess Max von Sydow's Oscar nomination makes this the year of the silent performance.
Plot
Look, I know the premise could never deliver on it's promise. I still couldn't help but feel disappointed. The story can't decide whether it wants to be a broad examination of post-9/11 New York or personal story about a family's loss. It's bad enough that it's not even the best movie about a boy and a key.
9/11
This movie comes from a good place. The intentions are noble, but it comes together as sort of exploitative of 9/11. The most gripping moments rely on the fact that no one wants to relive that day, not the connection the boy has to his father. I can see how this film could make people angry with how it uses 9/11. I'm not in that camp, but they could've found a better story for the emotional point they tried to make.
New York
Look, I know the city isn't as bad as SVU makes it seem, but no amount of suspension of disbelief could make me think this kid could/should/would travel, often alone, all over the city to meet strangers. I realize they are going for a feel of community and togetherness, but come on. This is a bit much.
Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend
Haven't seen the movie, read the book, so all of my reactions to this are based on that. When it came out, among all of the 9/11 novels and stories at the same time that provided a broad examination of 9/11, this novel was an exception in the way it was mostly interior -- focusing solely on the story of the family's personal loss through the POV of Oskar Schell. It's his 1st person POV throughout the whole book, which it doesn't seem like was translated to the movie. It implies he is autistic, or at least borderline autistic but never actually confirmed, however it's fairly obvious from his language and consciousness. So, that aspect is supposed to be vague. The only real merit of the novel is Safran Foer's experimentation with Oskar's POV. It allows him to play with language, and even images. That, obviously isn't present in the movie. It shouldn't have been translated to film for this reason. Take that away, and all you have is an overly sentimentalized plot only somewhat intriguing and heartbreaking b/c 9/11 wasn't as long ago, and with a needlessly convoluted twist at the end. For your last point about him walking around NY unsupervised, did the movie also have it to where his mom orchestrated the whole journey? That, in itself, was unbelievable to me. No one does that.
ReplyDeleteCorrection: You also get his Dad's POV when he was younger in a few sections. But, my thoughts still remain valid to me. What made the book even considerable for any kind of praise was the experimental form and POV, something that could not be put to a movie, or if it could, was not for this. Without that element, the plot itself is a flop.
ReplyDeleteYeah. It had the twist with the mom at the end, which, while needed to redeem that character, was very convoluted.
ReplyDeleteIt was pretty bad in the book too. I throw around the phrase "needlessly convuluted" a lot, but there's really no other way for me to describe that plot at the end.
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