The Lovely Bones (2009)

Tags

Drama, Fantasy, Mark Wahlberg, Movie, Rachel Weisz, Romance, Rose McIver, Saoirse Ronan, Stanley Tucci, Susan Sarandon, The Lovely Bones

even my cool hat couldn't protect me...

PG-13

Saoirse Ronan, Mark Wahlberg, Rachel Weisz, Stanley Tucci, Susan Sarandon, Rose McIver

Buckley: Grandma, I know where Susie is.
Grandma: Yeah, Susie’s…gone to heaven, sweetheart.
Buckley: Lindsey says there is no heaven.
Grandma: Alright then, she’s dead.
Buckley: You might be dead soon.
Grandma: Why do you say that?
Buckley: Because you’re old.

After being murdered, Susie (Ronan) is stuck in a sort of limbo between earth and heaven, unable to move forward due to the ties she can’t break.  Meanwhile, her family struggles to move on after being struck by this tragedy.

Yikes, this movie is just all over the place.  Is it a serious drama about a murdered 14 year old girl?  Is it a Twilight-esque love story?  Is it dark and scary?  Is it a family movie with a few comedic interludes?  Well…it tries to be all of them, and only succeeded occasionally.

I liked some of the visuals and the idea of Susie being unable to leave behind her need for vengeance and her desire to protect her family.  That stuff was pretty good, but the entire romantic subplot involving her need for one kiss with this boy she knew for about 12 minutes was tiresome.  As was the entire grandmother character.  She’s supposed to be some big whirlwind of personality, but she feels totally out of place in this movie.  Especially the montage of her cleaning up the house.  It reminded me of the clean-up montage featuring Goldie Hawn in Overboard.  That fit in that movie…not in this one.

Also, I hate to say it, but Mark Wahlberg once again displays his lack of dramatic acting ability.  Plus, he and Weisz have absolutely no believability as a couple.  No chemistry there at all.  For this movie to work, the family needed to feel like a real, loving family, and it doesn’t.  It all just feels fake.  The only real quality performance is from Stanley Tucci.  He is very very creepy as the killer, George Harvey.  Maybe too creepy, as I’m not sure what kid (or adult) would trust that guy for a second.

The imagery of semi-heaven, or whatever it may be, is alright, but nothing profoundly great.  Those kinds of sequences are more in Peter Jackson’s wheelhouse, so I was expecting a little more from them I guess.

There are a couple of other good moments, and it will surely draw a tear or two at times (a story about murdered children is bound to), but all in all, it just feels like a big jumbled mess.  I’m sure the book had more room to expand on certain characters and themes, but obviously they couldn’t all fit into the movie.  So, we’re left with some shallow characters and a lot of confusing scenes.

Don’t follow creepy men into their creepy underground bunkers.

10 – 2.5 because the tone of the movie is just all over the place – 1 for the characters not being very well developed – 1 for some iffy acting = 5.5

Mr. Woodcock (2007)

Tags

Billy Bob Thornton, Comedy, Movie, Mr. Woodcock, Seann William Scott, Susan Sarandon

No jokes about my name...

PG-13

Seann William Scott, Billy Bob Thornton, Susan Sarandon

John Farley: You have a father?
Mr. Woodcock: Of course I have a father, Farley, I’m not Jesus.

John Farley (Scott) writes a book about overcoming your troubled past and is to be honored in his small home town.  Upon returning home, he learns that his mother is going to marry Mr. Woodcock (Thornton), the high school gym teacher that John blames for many of the psychological problems he suffered as a child.  Of course, John wants to stop this marriage from happening.

This is one of those comedies where it seems like they just didn’t have many jokes written.  I guess they assumed people would be laughing at the name Woodcock, but that wasn’t even really funny the first time, much less the next 100 times it’s said.

It’s not a hatefully bad movie, it’s just boring.  It was good to see Seann William Scott playing a more reserved, normal character than he usually does, and I give Thornton props for maintaining his character throughout the movie.  But, a comedy depends on funny dialogue, and this movie hardly even makes an attempt at it.

Susan Sarandon is good as Farley’s mother, and she’s probably the main reason the movie is at least somewhat palatable.

I think the script needed somebody funny to take another look at it and write in some more jokes here and there.  There’s way too many times when you’re watching the plot unfold and you realize, “shouldn’t there be more jokes here?  This is a comedy, right?”

10 – 5 for missing the funny + .2 for the performances = 5.2