Disjointed Mystic River disappoints

Rating: Null/10 (2 August 2004)

I watched Mystic River on Pay-per-view this weekend. Since I highly respect Clint Eastwood's directing activities, I was looking forward to this film quite a bit, especially in view of the Oscar nominations it received and awards that it won. However, I found the film somewhat disjointed. Since the name of the film is "Mystic River" perhaps it could have had a more coherent flow if Eastwood had used the theme of the river to stitch together the different events in the lives of the main characters. For example, when the young boy was abducted, use the river as his means of escape. Later, have the river disgorge the body of Ray Harris after the Sean Penn character is released from prison. Place the discovery of Sean's daughter's body near the river. Likewise, have the river connected to Dave Boyle's activities. (I'm trying hard not to write a spoiler).
As it was, I thought it was misleading to portray the Sean Penn character as having only a little brush with the law as a young man. His relationship to the Savage brothers indicated a much darker character than that. There was no background story of the problems the Tim Robbins character had suffered throughout his adult life as a result of his childhood molestation. The relationship between the three main characters was not close so the emotional impact of the conclusion was blunted and rather muddled. Robbins and Penn were both good in their roles but I would not place either of their performances in the "best actor" category. I know Hollywood is, for some reason, down on Tom Cruise as an actor, but he definitely portrayed more emotional range in "The Last Samurai" than anyone in Mystic River.