Admirable, but couldn't get into it

Rating: 5/10 (2 June 2013)

I had trouble getting into Cast Away right from the start. A lot of that has to do with Hanks, who I'm just not a big fan of. And that long FedEx speech, while somewhat interesting, was just not anything that would really happen.
I was feeling bored and restless, but I knew the real movie was to come, and the plane scene was pretty stunning and very intense, so that gave me hope.
Once he made it to the castaway section, well, I really respect the movie for it's gritty, almost wordless portrayal of a man with no camping skills grimly pushing himself to survive. It's very brave to offer so little dialog. But I just didn't feel it. I saw what the film was doing, I appreciated what it was doing, but I did not connect viscerally with the story. I'm not sure if this is because of my feelings about Hanks or because of the direction, which to me seems a little too Hollywood to really capture the pain and struggle.
People love this movie, and I can see appealing things about it, but I gave up after an hour of just not caring.