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- Jan 2, 2007
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To be honest, when entering this movie I had an uneasy feeling in my stomach. I loved the novel, it was elegantly written and thoughtful, but at the same time it was rather disturbing and more than a little upsetting. In case you have never read the novel or don't know much about the story, here's the set up *I should make a note here that its not exactly a pleasant one*: Young Susie Salmon is on her way home when she is confronted by her neighbour, George Harvey. Harvey talks her into going into his den, where he rapes and murders her. He divides the remains and locks them into a safe, and the story follows Susie in heaven as she watches over her family as well as her killer, learning to cope with various emotions such as desperation, loneliness, hatred, etc. and as hard as it is, come to terms with what has happened to her.
Regardless, I expected Peter Jackson to do the book justice, sadly not. The problem with the film version is that there's too much padding and sugar coating, its almost as if Jackson himself was a little too bothered by the novels upsetting themes, and so more time is spent on Susie visualizing heaven and showing us pretty images then the plot going underway, and it suffers. In fact it renders the film rather emotionally numb.
It goes without saying that if you are to care for a cast of characters, they have to be interesting and well developed. By having Susie spend more time in Heaven and not watching over her family, we never really get to know her family. In the novel, they used this as a way to build their characters; Susie watched over them going through a normal day and narrating their unique traits as well as the certain situations that occurred before her death, and waited until they were strong characters to start into their life after her vanishing. The film doesn't do this, and her family are flaccid and uninteresting and Jackson doesn't do anything about it, and this takes out nearly all of the emotion and makes the film fairly dull.
Another thing that feels like sugar coating is the addition of a friend Susie gets in heaven. In the novel, this character and others existed as part of an elaborate phantasmagoria: They would appear to her and sometimes even talk, but she could never respond or get close to them, and eventually they would vanish. They represented her fear of being alone and once again, were meant to train her to cope with it. In the film this is not true, she gets a friend and yet more time that could've been spent fixing the families characters is wasted.
The best part of the film is arguably the performance by Saoirse Ronan as Susie, as well as Stanley Tucci as Harvey. Both do a great job, and you can tell Saoirse was at least trying to capture the emotions found in the novel despite Jackson's flawed script and she even succeeds a few times, and there is some chemistry between the two even if it is mostly indirect and Jackson does at least do a better job of fleshing out Harvey and the emotions Susie goes through looking down on him and how seeing his life reveals what may have driven him mad.
In the end, The Lovely Bones isn't a terrible movie, it's just dull and emotionally numb. It lacks any teeth and what should be an emotionally nerve wracking story is made dull due to padding and just a bit too much sugar coating. To be fair, it follows the book well in the regards that the plot rarely ever deviates from the bare basics of the novels structure and sequence of events, but it simply forgot to keep the point of the book. Jackson is talented enough that he could've pulled this film off, and his direction is still tight and the film does look good but beyond that, there's really not much to say other than it was disappointing and bland.
6.0/10
Content Note for parents and the discretionary:
The film is rated PG-13 and it never really pushes that barrier. The rape & murder is, thankfully, not showed in any form of detail and beyond that the film isn't overtly violent or sexual, but there are scenes early on that could still be considered frightening and a little disturbing. Otherwise the film is fairly tame, despite the overall thematic element.
Regardless, I expected Peter Jackson to do the book justice, sadly not. The problem with the film version is that there's too much padding and sugar coating, its almost as if Jackson himself was a little too bothered by the novels upsetting themes, and so more time is spent on Susie visualizing heaven and showing us pretty images then the plot going underway, and it suffers. In fact it renders the film rather emotionally numb.
It goes without saying that if you are to care for a cast of characters, they have to be interesting and well developed. By having Susie spend more time in Heaven and not watching over her family, we never really get to know her family. In the novel, they used this as a way to build their characters; Susie watched over them going through a normal day and narrating their unique traits as well as the certain situations that occurred before her death, and waited until they were strong characters to start into their life after her vanishing. The film doesn't do this, and her family are flaccid and uninteresting and Jackson doesn't do anything about it, and this takes out nearly all of the emotion and makes the film fairly dull.
Another thing that feels like sugar coating is the addition of a friend Susie gets in heaven. In the novel, this character and others existed as part of an elaborate phantasmagoria: They would appear to her and sometimes even talk, but she could never respond or get close to them, and eventually they would vanish. They represented her fear of being alone and once again, were meant to train her to cope with it. In the film this is not true, she gets a friend and yet more time that could've been spent fixing the families characters is wasted.
The best part of the film is arguably the performance by Saoirse Ronan as Susie, as well as Stanley Tucci as Harvey. Both do a great job, and you can tell Saoirse was at least trying to capture the emotions found in the novel despite Jackson's flawed script and she even succeeds a few times, and there is some chemistry between the two even if it is mostly indirect and Jackson does at least do a better job of fleshing out Harvey and the emotions Susie goes through looking down on him and how seeing his life reveals what may have driven him mad.
In the end, The Lovely Bones isn't a terrible movie, it's just dull and emotionally numb. It lacks any teeth and what should be an emotionally nerve wracking story is made dull due to padding and just a bit too much sugar coating. To be fair, it follows the book well in the regards that the plot rarely ever deviates from the bare basics of the novels structure and sequence of events, but it simply forgot to keep the point of the book. Jackson is talented enough that he could've pulled this film off, and his direction is still tight and the film does look good but beyond that, there's really not much to say other than it was disappointing and bland.
6.0/10
Content Note for parents and the discretionary:
The film is rated PG-13 and it never really pushes that barrier. The rape & murder is, thankfully, not showed in any form of detail and beyond that the film isn't overtly violent or sexual, but there are scenes early on that could still be considered frightening and a little disturbing. Otherwise the film is fairly tame, despite the overall thematic element.
