"See our cast away, here on Gilligan's Isle..."

Rating: 2/10 (7 January 2004)

CAST AWAY has an interesting start. Tom Hanks can carry a romantic drama. But this movie is not a romantic drama.
Soon there is a jumbo jet plane crash in the Pacific Ocean. The crash as depicted would truly splinter the aircraft and kill all, but anyway Tom survives. Not only is he fully conscious and makes it to the surface of the water, but a lone jet engine remains high above water during the crash and begins to chase after Tom. Tom escapes.
There is a special effects problem here. When Tom first makes it to the surface and while he is being chased by the jet engine, the ocean has small white caps. But then after Tom escapes from the jet engine, the ocean instantly has giant swells. First the ocean waves are too small to reach the bottom of the jet engine, then next they are three times bigger than the engine. There is no continuity.
Tom washes up on the shore of a small tropical island. On the wide screen it might be fine, but on TV there is never a single shot showing the whole island. The movie is spent on a beach always facing in the same direction. There is a strong sense that the "island" is only 180 degrees, and not 360 degrees around.
To be honest, if I were lost on a small tropical island, I know I would starve to death within a couple of weeks. Still, any person would do their best to try to survive. There are some obvious things any person would do.
A person would make a home base at a dry shaded location high enough to be far from big storm waves. A person would take stock of everything they had. All man made items would be saved as being rare and precious.
In CAST AWAY, Tom Hanks digs a hole and puts the dead pilot inside with all of his cloths on, and then covers him.
In real life, most anyone would take the cloths off of the pilot and keep them because the clothing has high value. Also, most men I think would use pieces of the dead pilot's body as bait for fishing.
In CAST AWAY, Tom completely wastes the batteries to his only flashlight, and in general he acts like his "frantic guy" character from his MONEY PIT movie. Too often, Tom is in "frantic guy" mode but it is not funny enough to be a comedy.
The island portion of CAST AWAY does not ring true to life. The unrealistic aspects make this movie very difficult to enjoy.