Geekscape Movie Reviews: Water For Elephants
A stylish period piece set during The Great Depression and filmed without an over abundance of special effects or CGI, the film relies on good old fashion story-telling, rich and dynamic characters, and exquisitely decorated sets that brings to mind an age not seen in Hollywood for many years.
About to take his final exam as a veterinary student, Jacob Jankowski (Robert Pattinson), suffers a tragedy that leaves him penniless and emotionally devastated as his family dies in a tragic car accident. At a loss for what to do with his life, he hits the road and finds himself climbing aboard a moving train that is transporting a variety of exotic animals and colorful people, otherwise known as The Benzini Brothers Circus.
Given the choice between being red-lighted (thrown off) or performing good honest work (shoveling horse manure) he accepts the latter and meets the beautiful and enchanting center ring performer, Marlena (Reese Witherspoon), who happens to be married to the emotionally flawed owner and ringmaster, August (Christoph Waltz).
Jacob, Marlena, and August toast to his brilliant idea for a new act involving an adulterous scenario… and the elephant, Rosie, is not part of it.
Water For Elephants is an epic story re-imagining the life of a traveling circus in the early 1930’s and centered on a love triangle set in the same style as the film The Notebook – told from the point of view of an aged story teller – Hal Holbrook (currently the TV Show – The Event).
He opens the movie as Jacob, alone and forgotten standing in the rain, in front of an empty circus main way looking confused and frail. But as he begins to tell us the story of his past his face lights up with hope and joy. The moment is short, but the actor is tremendous with his brilliant blue eyes telling us that there is more in what he has seen as a young man than what we see standing before us.
Holbrook reeled me in to the world of the the traveling circus as he sets the stage for this epic tale and the ground work for the role to be taken up and played by much younger actor Robert Pattinson.
Holbrook is the oldest actor to ever be nominated for an Academy Award
for his work on 2007’s Into The Wild
Every movie has it’s moments where an actor gets to be center stage, and really show their stuff. In this film, even though Jacob is the main character <Pattinson>, has few powerful or meaningful lines to deliver, but instead has to rely on his expressions to convey his characters motivations. Pattinson, like Holbrook is talented in saying a lot with his eyes and expressions and the casting choice for them to play the same character was smart.
Pattinson has these compassion filled expressions that convey so much with only a handful of words, and his comfort level around the circus animals looks natural. If he didn’t have two more vampire movies coming out I think that this film would have been a great departure for him to showcase that he is more than a teen heart throb with bushy eyebrows and a cowlick that so many guys love to hate. Unfortunately, he has this great performance in Water For Elephants that gives him a breathable chance of redemption but it may be forgotten when the machine that is Twilight rears it’s profitable head come July 21st at Comic Con Intl.
Marlena and Jacob have a moment together, to bad Witherspoon blows it with her wooden persona.
His love interest is played by Reese Witherspoon who was completely miscast for this role and doesn’t resonate well with her character. It takes two to have chemistry on the set, but somehow she comes across as stiff and puppet-like. Somehow, Pattinson still pulls off a believable performance to her wooden one coming across smitten and enthralled even though she’s really not.
Witherspoon is a fine actor as we have seen in many other roles but in Water For Elephant she holds the film’s love story back with an innate rigidity. On the positive side, she does well in many of the physical scenes where she’s performing with horses and the elephant. It’s just that when she’s evoking this sense that Jacob should be lusting after her, she really fizzles and so does the big love triangle moments. It’s like she was going through the motions of acting but not really feeling the role.
She’s more like the cute girl next door, and not the lady you risk your life for. In her moment to shine, she definitely lacked luster and left me with a so what feeling. Her main costume was also distracting as it looked like she was showing off more than she was. I expected more from her.
This was a candid photo between scenes and not an actual still – She’s scantily clad for the 1930’s, even as circus performers go.
Even though Witherspoon wasn’t the star performer of the film for me, I was once again, taken with Christoph Waltz. He had the the choicest dialogue in the film as August and took full advantage of those moments to craft a complex character.
He plays a sadistic tyrant that you want to hate him for being so cruel and merciless, but then Waltz captures some essence in getting you to feel sorry for him, similar to the character he played in Inglourious Basterds in which he won the Oscar. To take an ugly character and somehow create this aura that you feel sorry for them in light of the havoc they have ensued is an amazing acting fete. When I read the novel, I had no sense of ever feeling sorry and hopeful that the August character would ever be anything more than a bad guy/villain in the story. Waltz portrayal brings a lot more depth than the original work and is by far the best performance in the film. He has several moments to shine, and in every scene, he does. It’s one of the stronger performances of a supporting actor so far this year.
August and Marlena toasting to their new acquisition, Rosie – the elephant.
Even though Robert Pattinson (Remember Me (2010) has a world of fans, he also has a equal number of movie-goers done with the whole vampire thing… setting that aside, he really is good in the film and I hope some of the would be haters out there give this film a chance, as you’d be missing out on something special. Water For Elephants is no Titanic and doesn’t pull at the heart strings as much as The Notebook, but it’s still enjoyable and well made. The rich tapestry in which the story is set is a large part of what sustains the film for the 122 minutes. There are many moments in the film that are rich and touching. Even so, not as good as I was hoping for, being a fan of the original work. The film still managed to hold my attention and I enjoyed it overall. If you’re a guy who just can’t stand Pattinson and get roped into going to this film, take heart, he gets beat up and punched at least five times.
This film was screened at Pacific Place AMC Theaters in Seattle, WA April 20th by Allie Hanley.
