Cast Away review

Rating: 8/10 (18 October 2016)

Cast Away
The critically acclaimed movie Cast Away is a test to one man's psychological and physical will to live. It stars Academy Award winner Tom Hanks and that is about it. Oh and his buddy Wilson (a volleyball). Robert Zemeckis is the director, who was also the lead man in Forest Gump. Hanks and Zemeckis really work well together in this survival flick. Cast Away accurately describes man's will to survive, even when times become desperate.
Tom Hanks plays and average man named Chuck Noland who is a supervisor for the corporate shipping business FedEx. His girlfriend is Kelly Frears, played by Helen Hunt. The filmed is based in 1995, where Chuck and Kelly live in Memphis. The beginning of the film has him struggling with the daily duties of his FedEx job, where is placed in Russia, among other places. He seems to be a normal man in which he is slightly overweight, and has a terrible tooth problem. Chuck wishes to marry the love of his life, Kelly, but business absence has halted the proposal.
One Christmas day 1995, Chuck gets an unexpected business call in which he has to travel on a plane again. Chuck and Kelly exchange gifts in their car before he boards the trip. Kelly gives Chuck a compass with a picture of her inside of it. This plays an important role later in the plot. Like the title of the film implies, the plane has some technical difficulties and ends up crashing into the Pacific. A water raft ends up saving his life, and to his amazement, he suffers little injuries. Isolated In the middle of the Pacific, Chuck floats to the nearest island he stumbles upon. His survival skills are immediately tested. He has to learn how to hunt, how to make fire, and how to stay sane. Chuck uses some of the FedEx deliveries to help him cope and survive. Some of those things are video tapes, ice skates, a dress, a mysterious unopened box and his famous companion, a volleyball (with a face) named Wilson.
Moreover, the island is a tropical one, with sand layering the outside. And tropical trees and some animals fill the deserted island. There is small mountains with rocks and trees covering them. Other than some lizards and bugs, the island is largely uninhabited as far as we can see.
Chuck continues to improve on his survival skills, while constantly thinking of Kelly and the people at home. He talks to a volleyball with a face to give him company. He eventually learns how to start a fire. Tom Hanks does a great job of showing the frustration his character displays after failing many times. He also learns how to hunt and fish on the little island, which also takes time. In the middle of the movie, Chuck appears on the screen with a large beard and long hair. We learn that the movie fast-forwarded 4 years without any of us seeing what happened in that time. While I won't spoil anything, Chuck attempts to take his life out to the unpredictable sea, desperate to see the world again.
Of course the rest of the movie will be up to you to see. For me, Cast Away is a great film to see about resilience, will-power, perseverance, you name it. But any movie could show those traits. How good does Cast Away do though? I think it does pretty well. It shows how desperate Chuck was when he was starting the fire, and how hard it was to take his life venturing out to the sea. He even talks to a volleyball, in which he pretends the volleyball says stuff back to him. But the perseverance the film attempts to show is when he was so lonely for so long. The writers make some of the scenes uninspiring like when was hunting and fishing, but also very unique, when Chuck was talking to Wilson. A lot of the movie could be viewed as boring, but it is definitely not uneventful. Everything that happens in the film means something in the climax and ending. The beginning is 'meh'. I think it accurately portrays the struggles of his job, but how it is nothing compared to what will happen later. The initial landing on the island is very interesting. I was quite curious as to what an average Joe would do in those desperate measures. Tom Hanks is especially well in this role. Hanks shows the curiosity and panic of someone with those unlucky circumstances. He masters the role of being by himself virtually the whole plot. That role would make or break the film, and Tom Hanks definitely "made it". It was an Oscar worthy performance by Hanks.
There were not a lot of 'negatives' in Cast Away. I think the story would not even be as close to as good as it was if it were not for the great performance of Tom Hanks. The dialogue between Wilson and Chuck would have been 'pushed' if it was anybody but Hanks. He drove the movie forward in bleak scenes, and took control over the movie. The writers did a fine job of showing the perseverance and willpower it took to try to survive on the island. The movie was dependent on Hanks' performance, and he killed it. While the film is Tom Hanks' dependent, Cast Away is a unique journey through the eyes of a desperate man's will to survive. That is why I give it an 8/10.