Feeling Better, Tough Guy?

I've mentioned before that my least favorite thing about going to the movies is the other people....
Let's face it, the general public can be annoying, and it's difficult for me to concentrate on a film if I'm surrounded by a bunch of strangers. Sometimes, the theater will be crowded and I'll find that the only place to sit is in the middle of a row where ease of movement is limited; other times, I may be stuck in a room populated by loud talkers or small children; occasionally, I'll run into the dreaded seat kicker (behind me), or compulsive text messager (in front of me). All of these folk make a motion picture considerably harder to enjoy, and I've found that I'm far less likely to encounter one of them if I just watch a DVD at home instead.


Nevertheless, I still do go out to the movies on a fairly regular basis (for reasons I've already explained), and an article I saw over at Hollywood Elsewhere the other day had me thinking back to my worst experience with someone else in the crowd. It was about two years ago, and the film was Joe Wright's Atonement. I had gone to an out-of-the-way art theater to see the movie because it wasn't available in the larger multiplexes near home, and I was pretty excited about the experience, having waited months for Atonement's US release. Well, in the crowd was THIS FRIGGIN' GUY who just would NOT stop playing around with a bag of candy he'd apparently smuggled in. I mean, it was beyond obnoxious -- every ten minutes, I'd hear a paper bag being loudly crumpled, followed by candy bar wrappers and Dorito bags being opened and thrown to the ground.

I mean, the guy would not quit, and I wondered if he was trying to annoy the rest of the audience on purpose. This was a fairly high-class, hoyty-toyty sort of venue, and he was making a ridiculous amount of noise. How did this rude oaf even get in??? Every ten minutes, man -- crumple, crumple, crumple...riiiiiip....crumple, crunch, crumple....COUGH COUGH....CRUMPLE....I cannot stress enough how distracting this person was.


Every time a key dramatic moment with intricate dialogue arrived: CRUMPLE, CRUMPLE, RIIIIIIP....

When a moving battle scene of great importance to the plot came up: RUSTLE, CRUMPLE, RIIIIIIIPPP....

During the climax of the story, in which earth-shattering revelations were made: COOUUGHH....RIIIIPPPP....CRUMPLE....AAAA-CHOOOO....CRUMPLE!!!

I shifted in my seat, shot dirty looks at the offender, and rolled my eyes...but none of these passive-aggressive methods of conveying irritation were effective. He continued creating a disturbance, and finally, at the height of my rage, I leaned over in his direction and hissed, "SHUT THE %&*# UP!" loudly. My mother, whom I had brought along for the trip, grabbed my arm, and shushed me in horror, but I was not to be placated. The film was ruined.

As the end credits rolled and I got up to exit the theater, I took a close look at my mysterious noise-maker to find out what someone so annoying might look like in the light. WEEELLLL...wouldn't you know it?

He was mentally disabled. Yeah, it was just obvious. And his caretaker shot me a nasty look.


I SWEAR I had no idea the dude was disabled when I cursed at him, and I felt pretty bad about the whole situation. Still, that's EXACTLY the kind of thing that always happens when I try to get assertive in public. I can't even be a jerk to another jerk; my opponent will still find some way to beat me. Fine. You win this round, unknown handicapped guy. Luckily, I didn't run into any such nemesis during my weekend screening of THIS picture.

The Lovely Bones (2009)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0380510/


Netflix description:
When 14-year-old Susie Salmon (Saoirse Ronan) is murdered, she watches from above as her family deals with her tragic death -- and as her killer prepares to strike again. Torn between vengeance and healing, Susie's loved ones are forever changed. Mark Wahlberg and Rachel Weisz star in Peter Jackson's adaptation of Alice Sebold's riveting best-selling novel; Susan Sarandon and Golden Globe nominee Stanley Tucci co-star.

First of all, The Lovely Bones is not what I thought it would be. Considering the pre-release hype, and the teenage girls I saw in the crowd, I figured this one would be some kind of Twilight-style chick flick. To an extent, it is; but, fundamentally, the film is morbid and at times downright disturbing.

It's about a suburban 14 year-old girl named Susie who gets brutally murdered by a psychotic neighbor. This guy, named George, is a real piece of work -- he stalks our heroine for weeks, carefully laying out plans to trap her in a little dungeon that he's built in a corn field. When it all goes down, Susie winds up as a ghost (or something similar), trapped between worlds as she tries to tie up loose ends in the realm of the living. For one thing, she wants to help her parents and the police catch George the killer; for another, she needs time to come to grips with the fact that she must move on into another plane and leave her loved ones behind.

Learning to accept death is as important to The Lovely Bones as its murder story, and the shift of emphasis between these two themes can make the experience somewhat uneven. I mean, every time I started to feel fully engaged in one element of the plot, the film would take a drastic turn into different territory. Half of it consists of beautiful CG scenes in the netherworld -- Susie's "spiritual guide" (another young girl) explains to her the nature of Heaven, imploring our heroine to take a final step into the light. These bits are indeed quite beautiful, but they clash with the OTHER half of the movie: that which is taking place in the "real world."

Many of those scenes focus on Susie's killer, George. Played skillfully by Stanley Tucci, this character is one of the creepiest I've seen in a film for some time. He spends his nights collecting newspaper clippings about the girl's disappearance and plotting his next murder. As an audience, we desperately hope for his capture; this guy is evil incarnate and needs to be brought down. I credit Tucci, and director Peter Jackson, for making this aspect of the film so effective. Hey, I've seen tons of serial killer movies, and rarely do I actually CARE if the psycho gets caught. The Lovely Bones goes to show that a good filmmaker CAN get a moral point across, even to a jaded viewer like myself.

I spent much of the film wondering why the killer hasn't yet been caught. For as calculating he is, George is also a bit reckless. I mean, cutting a girl's throat in an open field right behind a bunch of houses??? Someone could have SEEN him, not to mention all of the forensic evidence something like that would leave behind! Then there's the way he lurks around the woods watching teenagers make out in the middle of a police murder investigation. Why didn't the cops notice such strange behavior in the neighborhood? I guess George is lucky that this story takes place in the early 1970s, before DNA and all of that stuff made it possible for the CSI gang to solve murders based off microscopic drops of blood and dandruff flakes. In our age, he would have been toast.

The inability of police to find Susie's killer bothered me. So did the behavior of her mother, who ditches the family a few months after Susie's death to go work on an orchard. Yeah, our daughter just got murdered, so I think I'll abandon everyone for a while! What a great mom. Fortunately, Susie's father, played by Mark Wahlberg, is there to manage the family and try to solve the girl's murder. I think I liked this character the most. We feel for him, and at times he's almost heroic. There's also sidestory about a boy who Susie liked and some goth chick who can kind of see ghosts, but they only seem to pop in and out of the picture at the beginning and the end. This is a good thing, since both characters are so irritatingly cliche' that they could have been developed by an actual 14 year-old (the boy, Ray, has to be the biggest wuss I've seen in years), and I'm not entirely sure why they were considered necessary. I assume both of them must have featured more prominently in the novel.

Anyway, The Lovely Bones is a well-made film, generally effective and occasionally moving. It held my attention most of the way through, despite a few frustrating moments when I felt its focus should have been elsewhere. I tip my hat at Peter Jackson for pulling off a coherent adaptation of what was apparently some difficult source material, but I wonder if the film would have been better off following fewer paths. See The Lovely Bones only if you're in the mood for something contemplative and a little creepy. Otherwise, just stick to the book.

3 out of 5.

b.