wonderful

Rating: 10/10 (30 November 2007)

This is a wonderful movie. There are many shots I saw the first time around that are some of the best moments I've ever seen on film (and I'll have to see it again -- I'm sure there were many I missed): Where we first see Christopher walking in Los Angeles, instantly recognizable as a homeless man, and not Supertramp; Where the slab park singer is walking with Christopher, just behind his shoulder -- you see longing in two people walking -- that's art, folks -- isn't that the kind of thing films are supposed to be doing?; Many of the shots of homeless people in Los Angeles -- lots more -- if you love films, you should run to see this.
Has any director ever shot people just walking and talking better than Sean Penn does in this movie? I don't think so. Those moments where you see a face, see a reaction, and in life, you ignore it, or at least you don't comment on it. There are many dozens of moments like that in this movie, where you do see those moments, you are encouraged to experience them, and those moments are all loving in this movie, even when the character is doing some bad stuff.
I'm guessing that some of the just folks in this movie are not actors. This achieves one of those things that is rare in art, where it reaches out and touches life, and thus draws you in even more.
I read the story in Outside Magazine years ago, then I read the book. I gotta say, Sean Penn's movie is better than the book, at least where I read it. Because, with the movie, you can decide for yourself whether Christopher is a hero or not -- but with the book, I ended up with this picture of a poor misguided kid wasting away in that bus -- (that artifact of a past that was not even his) -- but in the movie, I saw that bus as taking that kid somewhere. And it's the first movie in many many years that took ME somewhere.
How is it that Sean Penn gets better acting out of actors than any other director? I've never liked Hal Holbrook in anything, and he is superb in this. Catherine Keener as a hippie? You expect her typical shtick, maybe -- but she's amazing in this. Same thing with Vince Vaughn -- likable to begin with, even more likable when he underacts. And Christopher, with his face in almost every shot? I expected that Penn, given his overwrought actor-heroes (I won't name names), would show the classic hard glassy eyes of the lost, with that kid. But that's not how Penn did it at all. I liked (and felt I understood) Christopher more and more as the movie went on. And when I saw Christopher's last message to the world -- his little sign on the bus -- that's one of the most profound things in any film, ever.