Good direction from Spielburg and wonderful writing from Stoppard

Rating: 8/10 (19 July 2006)

Empire of the Sun I watched this again for the second time at the weekend a wonderful enriching film. Christain Bale's Jim is distinctly unlikeable a spoilt brat who when separated from his parent's and placed in an internment camp becomes a class one survivor and all of his hither-to hidden qualities emerge and flourish. The two most memorable scenes for me are when he looks at Basie (Malkovich) sat in the puddle of water after his Japanese friend has been murdered. In that scene Jim sees Basie for what he truly is enabling Jim to move on and seek his own rescue. The second very moving scene is when Jim's parents turn up to claim Jim amidst all the other lost children being reunited. Jim stands alone neither looking to the right nor to the left unable to move or seemingly to show any emotion, his mother can be seen standing at a distance and she has recognised Jim and moves towards him, very emotive. The film I believe is one of Spielburg's best although the critics slammed it at the time of its release. It also benefits greatly from having Tom Stoppard as screen writer a very gifted and talented man.