It's amazing what goes through your head when you can't feel your arm.

Rating: 10/10 (12 March 2011)

127 Hours is a shockingly true story about Aron Ralston (Franco) who ventures out to the Blue John Canyon without telling anyone his whereabouts. The unthinkable happens when he falls down a canyon and his arm become pinned by a boulder. He is trapped down there for five days struggling to survive going through some desperate measures one should never have to contemplate.
I've heard many say 127 is stupid, and just a boring film. They obviously have no appreciation for great scenery and a very involved soundtrack. The film is scored by Slumdog Millionaire's A.R. Rahman. Rahman is perhaps most famous from his song Jai Ho, which is a great motivating song. He scores this movie to perfection and intensity.
In a way I have sympathy for Ralston, and I don't. You're not the brightest of bulbs if you go out to a canyon and bring or tell no one. I wouldn't go within a hundred feet of a canyon or mountain. I damn sure wouldn't do it alone. But Ralston begins to become delusional and hallucinate about past relationship and his family members. He realizes he never appreciated life or anything in it. He does the unthinkable and amputates his harm with a dull pocket-knife.
The amputation scene was not what I expected. I expected it to be extremely gory, gruesome, and disgustingly unwatchable. It was pretty graphic, but not as graphic as I had hoped. It hardly made me cringe. Still very well done effect wise, just not as good as it's hype.
James Franco deserved the Best Actor Oscar most definitely. I haven't seen The King's Speech, but Collin Firth must've truly been something to beat Franco to the Oscar. He might not be Oscar material as a host, but he sure was it as an actor.
Is 127 Hours an autobiography? A documentary? A drama? Or maybe a "docudrama." It is an up close, in your face look at fear and hopelessness, and the closest thing you will get to that painful five days. It's almost like a documentary within a drama film. Something I've rarely seen. Further shows why Boyle's 127 Hours is a masterpiece on film.
Starring: James Franco. Directed by: Danny Boyle.