Quite the discussion raiser

Rating: 7/10 (18 February 2013)

Just before I left to see Life of Pi my cat had found a mouse in the garage. It got me to thinking about the food chain and the frailty of life. But it also got me to thinking about why we value one life so differently from the next. Something as simple as the size of an animal can determine how much we care for that animal. No one gives it a second thought if they find a mouse dead in the street, but if they come across a giraffe or an elephant, (which probably have a fifth of the character) in the same state, it'll bother them to no end. It was an amazing coincidence for me then, when the movie had an element of these themes about it too. It took it even further making us question one's faith and even questioning the legitimacy of what we've just seen.
Life of Pi is told from the point of view of the main character Pi Patel, many years after he was the survivor of a sunken ship and spent 227 days at sea accompanied by a ferocious tiger. The story has a lot of similarities with Cast Away, the most obvious probably being the sole relationship of an unexpected companion. In Cast Away it was a volleyball, here it is a tiger. While it is a necessary plot device to have these "characters" in the story, it is also fascinating to see just how close and reliant the main character becomes on them. Something that I imagine would actually genuinely be the case if you were in that situation.
The cinematography is astonishing throughout and seeing it in 3D (even though I'm not the biggest fan of the format) was just the icing on the cake. This is a tough film to review because it leaves itself very open to interpretation. The message boards are flooded with questions and every answer to them is unique and of a slightly different opinion. Ang Lee has done well in keeping this a talked about and debated piece of cinema. I have my own opinions on most of the questions too, but to throw them out there now would be wrong. It could lead you to come to a conclusion you wouldn't otherwise have come to and it would also ruin a bit of what is fun about the ending. Go in with an open mind, form your own opinions and then take the time to read some other people's ones too. Life of Pi can be as much fun after the film as it is during.