I'll start with the positives. I was impressed with Rob Pattinson's solid performance as Tyler, the rebellious young hero. I didn't see any sign of Edward the vampire in this performance, although the main reason I went to see this movie was because of Rob. I was also impressed by Emilie de Ravin's performance as Ally. The two romantic leads were nicely matched, and they showed a natural chemistry together. I thought the supporting characters were well-acted, too.
Now that I've had a day to think about this movie, and to get past my strong initial reaction to it, I'd have to say that I don't recommend seeing it in the theater. (Sorry, Rob and Twilight fans.) If you'd like to read more of my review, there will be spoilers ahead, but I'll try to keep them to a minimum, which is hard to do, because of the movie's ending.
For most of the movie, I thought the characters and their relationships were compelling and believable. Even though I kept wishing Tyler would just take a shower (an opinion shared by another of my movie-going friends), I really enjoyed watching this slow-moving love story unfold.
But the ending ruined the entire movie for me. No, more than ruined it. I think the ending was gratuitous, manipulative, and exploitive. Because of the ending, I do not recommend this movie. I do not want Hollywood to make any money off such a sensitive and painful event in our history, and I don't want to encourage other exploitive movies to follow this one.
I think the movie could have dealt with this sensitive subject by letting us know up front what to expect. Instead, the movie just pulled the rug out from under us. I have to ask, if you spend an entire movie getting us to care about a group of characters, rooting for them, looking for a happily ever after, why would you just blow them away with, for example, an asteriod? The romance movie becomes a cheap disaster movie. And we all feel cheated.
I rate this movie 2 out of 5 stars. I give it 2 stars because of the good acting.
No comments:
Post a Comment