The Good, The Bad & The Ugly: ‘The Lovely Bones’ Movie Review

Film — January 15, 2010 at 16:32 — no comments

Clark Kent says: Peter Jackson’s adaptation of Alice Sebold’s best selling novel finds the newly knighted director combining beauty and dire ugliness in a single frame. ‘The Lovely Bones’ at best is similar to the Robin Williams/Cuba Gooding Jr. starring flick, ‘What Dreams May Come’. But is that a good thing? See if so after the jump.

GOOD: ‘Lovely Bones‘ is as hypnotically attractive as it is oddly off-putting. A combination that Peter Jackson uses at length to disarm the audience before effectively pulling them deeper into Sebold’s story. Saoirse Ronan narrates and stars in this movie as Susie Salmon – a 14-year-old girl murdered by a serial killer. Jackson gives us enough time to get to know Susie and her family (her parents are played by Rachel Weisz and Mark Wahlberg) before her light is duffed out. Peter also does an excellent job of not abusing the suspense factor in ‘The Lovely Bones’. The flick could have went overkill, leaping into psychological thriller territory, but the film tells it story using warm, carmelized emotions that immerses the audience into the shattered world of a murdered 14-year-old without going all Hitchcock-y on us.

BAD: While this movie isn’t a standard serial killer flick, the cast tends to shift the tone drastically in certain scenes. Susan Sarandon plays the family’s bee-hived, cigarette smoking grandmother. When she enters onto the scene, the film goes into an uncomfortable tone. Mark Wahlberg also seems to be out of his league in ‘The Lovely Bones‘. It just seemed like his heart wasn’t in it. He’s bland and appears to go through the motions without any hint of depth — even though he’s lost his child to an unknown murderer. The CG used in the flick wasn’t as inspiring as it was in Jackson’s other films (‘Heavenly Creatures’) and serves as mostly unfulfilled eye candy.

UGLY: ‘The Lovely Bones‘ doesn’t seem to have found what it was looking for. With some small fractures with the casts’ role, Stanley Tucci shines as the creepy next door neighbor, and Saoirse Ronan is amazing as his victim. It doesn’t help that both Tucci and Ronan are Oscar nominated actors. The brunt of this movie’s weight falls upon Jackson himself, who co-wrote the screenplay with partners Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens. He just isn’t adept with creating more tangible thrills. Similar to ‘What Dreams May Come,’ the film’s mystical elements — Susie’s afterlife and brief connection between the spirit world and our world — are shot in typical Peter Jackson flair, but this heavenly experience still feels a little earthbound in the end.

Clark Kent says: In short, if you’ve read Alice Sebold’s book, you’ll come away wanting a little bit more bang for your buck if you see ‘The Lovely Bones’ in theaters. This is a flick that I’ll wait hits the Netflix rounds and enjoy in the comfort of my living room. You can peep the trailer below: