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Friday, December 19, 2008
First look at “Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Through Botox, plastic surgery and obsessive exercise, people are always fighting the ravages of age.
So what happens when things go in reverse?
That’s the crux of “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” starring Brad Pitt, a loose adaptation of an F. Scott Fitzgerald short story which is already getting plenty of raves and award nominations from critics.
Here are some notable points from the film (while attempting to keep spoilers to a minimum):
— Clear your bladder before you enter the theater. The film lasts more than two hours and 30 minutes, covering about 85 years, from the end of World War I until Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
— The sweep of the film evokes a bit of “Forrest Gump,” which shouldn’t be a surprise since both films share the same screenwriter, Eric Roth. But “Curious” isn’t quite as interested in placing Pitt’s character Benjamin Button at points in history. The focus is on the love story between Button and ballerina Daisy Fuller (played as an adult by Cate Blanchett).
— There’s a flashback construct similar to that of “Titanic,” with a gravely ill Daisy in a New Orleans hospital while her daughter reads from Benjamin’s diary. Katrina looms.
— In the early scenes, when Pitt is very young but looks very very old, the film makers rely on oodles of CGI tricks to insert Pitt’s wrinkled face onto tiny stunt double bodies.
— It’s mesmerizing to watch Button age backwards as his hair grows thick and dark, wrinkles smooth out and age spots disappear.
— Don’t expect a lot of histrionics. Pitt and Blanchett play their characters with elegant cool and grace.
— Listen for a plethora of heard-it-before commentary about the passage of time. A sampling: “We will all end up in diapers.” “Nothing lasts.” “In the end, you have to let go.”
— This film is also a love letter to New Orleans, with the cameras capturing the warmth, the earthy colors and mystical romanticism of the storied city.
— Watch for Atlanta actress Edith Ivey, who plays a modest but crucial role as Button’s sweet piano teacher at the senior citizen’s home he grows up in.
— In this fictional world, nobody finds Button’s very unusual situation all that unusual. Rather, it’s accepted. In the real world, he would have been a media super-curiosity, scrutinized to the nth degree by scientists, especially near the end of his life as he got ever younger. But alas, that’s why this is a fairy tale.
