Jello Floats down the Mystic River

Rating: Null/10 (26 June 2004)

Mystic River is in a way Clint Eastwood's modern-day answer to The Unforgiven, though, it tends to drag a bit at times, dwelling too redundantly on the emotionalism of the characters. I was a bit thrown back into my seat and out of the film by the ridiculous character names (no fault of Eastwood's but rather the novelist, Dennis Lehane) of the Savage brother (who were savage street thugs) and Mr. Looney (who was a wacko store owner). But what took me most out of the film was the damned product placement for Jello Fat-Free pudding, which some idiot set designer stuck in a pantry. Beyond the fact that the camera seemed to focus more on the pudding than on the characters, the damned stuff needs to be refrigerated! No wonder Sean Penn's character was acting so bizarre. He was probably suffering from salmonella poisoning from eating bad pudding! Jello is owned by Kraft Foods, which, in turn is owned by Altria, the new tidied over corporate name for Philip Morris. All in all, the film has merit, though it lacked a cogent ending and Kevin Bacon's character's ridiculous relationship with his wife in the wake of it all (no pun intended) had nothing to do with the story and only served to cloud the plot.