ZEE'S REVIEWS

14th January 2009
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008)

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is a curious beast of a movie. If  I had to sum it up in two words, they would be 'absorbing' and 'long'.  Unfortunately these qualities tend to be inversely proportional to one  another.

Benjamin Button is a man who ages backwards, born old and growing  younger as time passes. The movie traces the course of his unusual  life, as he experiences love, war, friendship, family, pain, joy, and  discovery, while witnessing the great changes of the twentieth century. This is entwined with the development of his relationship with Daisy Fuller, the woman who becomes the love of his life.

Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett deliver admirable performances as the two leads, especially when portraying the characters at different stages of their lives, which they do convincingly and without relying on special effects alone. The movie is beautifully filmed and vividly  evokes the spirit of each era.

Its main flaw is its length, which is two and a half hours. It is a rare movie that can sustain its momentum for that long. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button spans 85 years and feels like a whole lifetime. While I liked it, I may have liked it more had there been less of it. But those with patience will probably find enough worthwhile to enjoy in this delicate fable about time and life.

Read Clementine's review of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008).