The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

I saw it with my sister and brother-in-law, not really expecting that great of a story or movie going into it. I figured I could guess the entire plot from the first 10 minutes or from the trailer I had seen. I was wrong.

Though the movie is not without it's shortcomings, it really worked. It was a really magical story, not just some movie trying to be magical. And I didn't know Cate Blanchett would be in it (she is one of my favorite actors/actresses). It's style visually really helped it by being both stunning and properly setting moods. It had really great characters and interesting development.

Sometimes little things in it just didn't work or seemed forced, but its really not much, and doesn't take much away from the movie. The two things i can think of right now are a butterfly that shows up a few times and having Hurricane Katrina in there seemed forced and out of place.

If you are unfamiliar with the main character, he is born with a disease where he is born old and grows to be young (based off of a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald). This seems far fetched, but it doesn't seem so in the movie, which has a gritty spiritualism. Benjamin Button, as a result of starting old, is faced with adults situations while not yet being mature. I love the movies where the plot is based off of a character growing up. Anyways, I really recommend this movie. I went into it not expecting too much, but was extremely entertained and satisfied walking out. I would talk more about some of the themes in the movie, but I really don't want to ruin the plot for anybody who may read this and hasn't seen it yet. And I'm tired of typing.

The Spirit

I just came back from watching The Spirit at the Huntinton 7 and I have mixed feelings about it. It definately accelled in some areas, and seemed to totally ignore others.

It worked as a comic book. It failed as a movie.

The Good:

The strongest point of the movie was the visuals. It had the comic book visuals which were beautiful and very stylistic. Very bold, bright colors contrasted with black and white. And shades in between. And it had very good cinematography-> shot to shot, it worked visually. And the third strength was Samuel L. Jackson as "The Octopus." He was a perfect fit, and went all-out with it. And he added some strength to the acting all around. If he wasn't there, I probably would've lost interest an hour into the movie and just walked out.

The Bad:

As I mentioned, the only strong actor in the movie was Samuel L. Jackson. Everyone else was just kind of "there." They said their lines and made each sentance as dramatic as possible. Some may say that that is just part of the comic book style: to have the characters be simple and bold and spur on the whole comic book theme. And I agree; it does work as a comic book. It fell flat as a movie. With Miller not really having Rodriguez there for this movie, you can really see all of Miller's strengths and the absense of Rodriguez's strengths. This movie needed a director. And the writing was really quite poor. If you haven't already seen the movie and are planning to, don't count on well-developed characters or a good satisfying plot.

The Low-down:

Excellent stylistic visuals, one good actor, bad writing, little directing skills, tight transitions, unsatisfying plot or characters. If you want to watch a visually appealing comic book for 1 hr. 45 min., but don't really care about character development, plot, or timing, you can definately have fun watching The Spirit. But if you do, watch it on the big screen. It won't be worth renting when it comes out.