Curious Case of Benjamin Button-
Step right up, kids, and see the world's first movie aquarium! Watch countless colorful characters float around aimlessly in a glass case!!! 'Cause that's what you get in "Curious Case of Benjamin Button", aka "The One Wear Brad Pitt Ages Backwards." And that's all the plot their is-Benjamin (Pitt, duh), ages backwards while his love Daisy (Cate Blanchett, the most beautiful actress alive today) ages forwards, and the two go off and see the ups and downs of the wide wide world while waiting for the day their biological clocks will meet in the middle. Sounds like a damned good plot, no?? Too bad it ended up in the wrong hands. David Fincher is a brilliant director, don't get me wrong. But the guy who directed "Se7en" and "Fight Club" helming a great romantic epic? Hellz no. Fincher almost seems embarrassed to be making something so heartfelt-he specializes in the cold, bruising, and shocking. So, afraid he might, you know, cause an audience member to shed a tear or something, he sucks the emotion out of his own movie. It always looks phenomenal-the opening, with Benjamin being born amongst a WWI peace-making celebration, is visual lead-in for the ages-and the actors given nicely organic performances-particularly Tilda Swinton as the British spy Button vents his sexual frustrations on. But what's missing is a sense of caring, of love, the love that the film celebrates so in its script, but that is lost in the final product. Oh, and did I mention this juggernaut feels every lazy second of its three-hour run time? This is the latest in a new era of modern film-one where emotion is out-of-vogue, replaced by a beautiful but frigid minimalism. It'll still win the Academy Award for Best Picture-but "Curious Case Of Benjamin Button" will also join the pantheon of the countless victors who didn't really deserve it. C+
Valkyrie-
On the flip side, "Valkyrie" came out of nowhere and blindsided me. It's the true story of a one-eyed wounded Nazi Colonel (Tom Cruise, not even trying for a German accent) who embarked on a blunt-force suicide mission to kill Hitler. In what could be called an anti-Button case, director Bryan Singer lets his film overflow with tension, emotion and white-knuckle, balls-out terror. Although we all know the outcome, enough suspense (never has a suitcase been such a scary object in movie history) is wrung from the ins and outs of the operation itself that one almost forgets what really did occur. A who's who of British thesps-Bernard Hill, Tom Wilkinson, Kenneth Branagh-pop up in small but smartly calibrated performances, and Bill Nighy (yes, Davy Joneeesssssss!), as a fellow anti-Hitler officer who doesn't see eye-to-eye with Stauffenberg, tears into the role with his typical head-spinning vigor. What's most surprising though is that, in the end, after all the missing limbs, explosives, shouted dialogue, backroom meetings, and detailed blueprints, it's an emotionally truthful spirit of passionate, motivated rebellion that ultimately defines this most surprising thriller. A-
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