Unearthly experiences compound the terror in The Lovely Bones, a pot-boiler of a movie from Paramount Pictures now freaking folks out at Tinseltown (on Pender, free parking), Colossus and Famous Players Silver City cites around B.C. Cult followings don’t come easy and die hard. Able to carve out an impressive niche among cinephiles everywhere has been Peter Jackson (The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring). Our favourite New Zealand ex-patriot continues to impress with his classy version of the best-selling novel from Alice Sebold. Time travel back and forth fleshes out the saga of one Susie Salmon. Cute as a button Saoirse Ronan (Atonement) oozes energy as this 14 year old who back in 1973 was just undergoing the rights of puberty. Tender moments showing Susie with friends and would-be friends help reveal her personality which is still changing day by day as she is at that experimental stage. Out of the blue one event would change Susie’s situation and open up all sorts of wounds with her family.
At home all seemed normal in the Salmon household. Led by numbers man Jack and loving wife Abigail these two cherished their children which included one baby brother and sister. Both Mark Wahlberg (Shooter) and Rachel Weisz (The Mummy) act out their parts well as caring parents who one day find themselves in a bit of a quandary. When Susie fails to come home from school the danger signals go up and The Lovely Bones takes a turn for the worse. Jackson succeeds in setting up a very creepy atmosphere and fleshes it out with some sinister people who inhabit this small rather close-knit community. Any time a child goes missing it sends chills through entire communities and this one is no exception. Never give up is a theme we can all relate to as well as seeking the truth.
Mark Wahlberg delivers a stirring testament of the pain and anger a father goes through not knowing the fate of his daughter while the trauma revealed by Rachel Weisz as the horrified mother also speaks volumes. Add on the appearance of an eccentric grandmother played up to the hilt by Susan Sarandon (Thelma and Louise) in one of her most free-spirited portrayals in years and you do feel for this entire family.
Readers of the hit book may recall that there was a dream like quality to it and an imaginary world between heaven and heart, sort of a never land. Seeing images of a no longer living Susie stare down at her living family who try to unravel what went wrong is a novel approach to getting out a message only here that world is rather confusing. Sequences in this in between world though quite picturesque don’t really add too much to the tale and rather muddle up the goings-on down below. We care about what’s happening to solve this tragedy on earth in real time and get lost whenever these imaginary moments pop up.
Tension is well positioned here with one creepy neighbour, George Harvey, particularly unnerving. Stanley Tucci (The Devil Wears Prada) can do evil with the best of them and he’s right up there with Hannibal Lector as a bad guy. Forget about violence here, our Mr. Harvey has a rather sinister, calculating mind and watching him ply his trade here is downright dastardly. Cold and chilling describe Tucci’s demeanour here.
Unfortunately a very weak ending with some way too altruistic dialogue at film’s closing take away from what would otherwise been a very good whodunit. Long at 135 minutes The Lovely Bones does involve some very good performances and a very clever slow-building suspenseful atmosphere but loses much impact whenever that “other” world tries to draw you in. Instead it pulls you apart.
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On, June 30, 2010, Benigno Simeon “Noynoy” Aquino III was sworn in as the 15th president of the Republic of the Philippines. Associate Justice Conchita Carpio-Morales and Jesuit Fr. Catalino Arevalo, a close friend of the Aquinos, who held the bible, swore in the only son of former Senator Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino and former president Corazon Cojuangco Aquino. To most Filipinos, this day was very memorable because it symbolizes the beginning of a new hope for the country, the hope of a clean and honest government.
