"BRAD PITT AND CATE BLANCHETT, STAR IN THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON".

"REVEW: THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON".

"BY KATHERINE MONK".

"BRAD PITT AND CATE BLANCHETT STAR IN THE CURIOUS OF BENJAMIN BUTTON".

"David Fincher tinkers with F. Scott Fitzgerald and turns a story of a man who ages backward into a sweeping romantic epic that spans over 70 years of history. Though the narrative shifts betray Fitzgerald’s original idea, and the scope of his cynicism, Brad Pitt’s central performance is so pure and transparent, we can’t help but get sucked into the colourful, and frequently fun, denouement".

"STARRING: BRAD PITT, CATE BLANCHETT, TARAJI P. HENSON".

"RATING: FOUR STARS OUT OF FIVE".

"Brad Pitt has a big problem, and until The Curious Case of Benjamin Button made it obvious, the sex symbol’s persistent plague was simply written off as the pretty-boy curse.
Pitt is too good looking to be a believable dramatic lead, went the reasoning. We’re constantly distracted from the meat and bones of his performances because we get lost in his blue eyes and massive musculature".

"But the real obstacle to Pitt’s rise as a powerful dramatic lead has less to do with his looks than with his comfort level on camera. Ever since his breakthrough appearance in Thelma and Louise, Pitt has never really looked like he was acting, he was just a handsome devil being his handsome-devil self, an idea that’s easy to affirm when he plays such characters as Jesse James or Mr. Smith".

"Yet there’s a lot going on behind the blue eyes and Midwestern manliness, and for the first time in his impressive but unlaurelled career Pitt is given a chance to transcend his natural good looks and onscreen comfort zone in the bizarre form of Benjamin Button".

"In the same way Charlize Theron earned acclaim as one of the top talents of her generation by getting ugly in Monster, and Nicole Kidman acquired genius intelligence by donning an extra half centimetre of schnoz as Virginia Woolf in The Hours, Pitt is released from the shackles of a pleasing appearance by becoming the shrivelled old prune at the centre of David Fincher’s adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s short story".

"Born as a wrinkled, frail and arthritic infant to a mother who died in childbirth, Benjamin is quickly abandoned by his biological father (Jason Flemyng) and brought to an old folks home where he becomes the ward of Queenie (Taraji P. Henson), a kind, childless African-American woman".

"Bucking the prediction of a quick death, Benjamin lives, and begins to grow up -- backwards. He learns to walk on his frail bones with crutches, and is forced to explore his new world as a wizened little man".

"Because he still looks human, and because little old men and little boys are often remarkably similar when it comes to behaviour, Benjamin’s birth defect isn’t all that noticeable, except to those who know him intimately".

"To explain the backward movement of Benjamin’s biological clock, filmmaker Fincher and screenwriter Eric Roth give us the story of Mr. Gateau (Elias Koteas), a blind clockmaker who loses his son in the First World War and creates a monolithic train station timepiece that marches backward as a gesture to the fallen".

"This intro, related by an aged Cate Blanchett lying in a New Orleans hospital bed as Hurricane Katrina closes in, is not part of the original Fitzgerald story. Nor, obviously, is the inclusion of Katrina, or the city of New Orleans for that matter".

"Fitzgerald’s story and Fincher’s epic drama are entirely different animals, and while they may share some thematic ground about the importance of living in the moment, Fitzgerald’s story was set on the eve of the American Civil War, which brought a different angle to the ideas of young and old, progress and regression".

"Fitzgerald’s story also approached love and romance with an almost nihilistic flair, as one might expect from the man who published The Great Gatsby three years later.
In Fitzgerald’s tale, Benjamin’s true love is Hildegard Moncrief, daughter of a general who prefers older men because they’re kinder".

"In Fincher’s romanticized adaptation, which fuses bits of Gatsby to the narrative, Benjamin falls for Daisy (Blanchett), the granddaughter of a resident at the old folks home".

"Daisy and Benjamin are immediately attracted to one another, but as one is a little kid and the other an old man, their only option is to strike up a strange friendship. Over the years, as Benjamin grows younger and Daisy grows older, the window to romance opens wider. They fall into each other’s arms in their mid-30s, squeezing the most out of each precious second".

"Fincher and Roth have turned a cool, smart and uptight examination of the romantic impulse into a story of dreamy longing. Thanks to some very impressive special effects that convincingly age Pitt and put him in the shrunken body of a disabled dwarf, the premise works as a grandiose romantic drama. Yet, beneath each scene you can almost hear the shudder of Fitzgerald’s narrative engine forced into reverse".

"The layers of story and theme do not always connect because Fitzgerald’s short story was laced with cynicism about love itself -- and the female desire to date older men because they are safer, and generally wealthier than their younger, irresponsible counterparts".

"Fincher barely acknowledges this cold, dark, class-conscious distrust of love and opens the floodgates to the more familiar brand of warm, schmaltzy, Hollywood melodrama".

"He includes such hackneyed additions as a deathbed narrator, mother-daughter bonding and An Affair to Remember-brand of tragic accident -- elements Fitzgerald would have loathed as empty, manipulative treacle".

"With so many gears and cogs moving in opposite directions, it’s a wonder the movie doesn’t self-destruct. If anything, it does the opposite and all credit for Fincher’s success goes to Pitt, who single-handedly carries this weighty burden and cradles it to the finish line".

"Pitt’s previously problematic comfort level pulls us in. He’s easy to watch, whether he’s a wrinkled old man or a smooth-faced heartbreaker. Moreover, he’s empathetic without being manipulative".

"Benjamin simply is, and by surrendering to this character without an agenda, Pitt becomes the transparent lens through which we experience the world".

"It still doesn’t feel like he’s acting, though. Pitt doesn’t possess the self-conscious approach to craft that makes someone like Tom Hanks stand out as an “actor.” In fact, 10 years earlier, this would have been a Hanks role and he would have turned it into Oscar gold".

"Pitt has a good chance at a nomination, but chances are his laid-back style and ability to “just be in the moment” won’t translate into a statuette -- even if his skills are the reason Benjamin Button is one of the best films of the year".

"NOTICIAS, NOMINACIONES, NOTICIAS".

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"BRAD PITT AND CATE BLANCHETT STAR IN THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON".

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