Needed A Little More Work

Rating: 5/10 (3 January 2001)

Don't get me wrong, Tom Hanks is a marvelous actor and has a very impressive (and deserved) selection of Academy Awards, but I just wasn't really impressed with a couple things in this film. Hanks' character just wasn't really believable and the script leaves us hanging.
For one, in the script, we seem to make a huge jump in the film when Hanks is stranded on the island. We jump from the first couple of days that he is there to four years later! This leaves a huge gap of time that seems to be forgotten. Sure, we see Hanks now, four years later, looking a lot thinner, bushy hair and a huge "Harley Davidson" beard. His survival techniques are a little more skilled, but that's pretty much it.
The second thing that needed a little more work was Tom Hanks' character. He just didn't seem like a man that was stranded on an island. He didn't seem like a man that has left his wife behind. I must say that I was rather shocked to find a Tom Hanks character unbelievable. I thought he was great in the GREEN MILE. SAVING PRIVATE RYAN was terrific! He had one of the greatest acting performances I have ever seen in FORREST GUMP. Just about every movie Hanks has done is extraordinary! But he just didn't have me believing that he was actually there.
And lastly, the ending (and I won't give it away for those who haven't seen the film) could have used a little more work as well. It just seemed rather tagged on and very short. Instead of wasting 15 minutes of film on what I thought to be unnecessary footage of Hanks floating in his raft on the ocean in the storm, elaborate on the ending! Don't leave us hanging! We were on that island with Hanks for about over an hour!
I walked away from the film with the same feeling that I did when I saw James Cameron's TITANIC. And that was that I just couldn't find it believable. You know your watching a good movie when you forget that you're watching a movie.
Bottom line: It just needed a little more work.
**1/2 out of ****