A collection of pretty videos of good actors

Rating: 5/10 (30 January 2014)

This film occasionally shows up on TV. I didn't want to go to sleep and there was nothing else to kill time with so I watched it. Seemed to be going somewhere - was slowly shaping up to be a heavy drama...but then it went somewhere else...and then somewhere else. It kept going and every time I thought it was about to end...it kept going. I eventually tuned out and changed the channel, watched another movie, perhaps a show or two, then went to exile for 25 years, went into cryostasis as societies of the world collapsed and mountains were eroded by wind. Then I returned, found the old TV, turned it on and...the bloody movie was still going! And after it was finally done, with a somewhat anti-climactic finale, I could not for the life of me tell you what this movie was about. It went here and it went there. It went everywhere. In the end, it is a movie about a father and sons living a life in the first part of the 20th century. Well that is fine and all, but why is it worth making a movie about? What saves this movie: characters. Brad Pit and Anthony Hopkins can combine powers to make even the worst turd look like gold. And these two actors really shine in this movie and manage to grab your attention for a while, but even they cannot do it forever and sooner or later you are returned to the void that is the story of this movie.
Yes certain scenes are really good and carry weight, but you need a good glue to bind the pretty pictures together. You need to keep the show moving. A book with great drawings still needs the words in between the drawings to be good.
The movie wears a veneer of art and I have a sneaky suspicion that this is why the movie is so overrated: as it pretends to be smart and artistic, some people are pretending to like it so as not to appear stupid or shallow.
In short: good actors, good scenery, but a long and flat story.