Obligatory "the book was better" comment, but I was still very impressed with the film

Rating: 7/10 (6 May 2016)

When I read the book a few years back, I absolutely couldn't put it down. The story is incredibly powerful and your heart aches for young Jack. The part where he escapes literally had my heart pounding in my throat. It was an overall incredible reading experience, and because the book set such high standards, I didn't expect the movie to be able to top it, as usually happens with movies based on fantastic books. However, "Room" took me by surprise and really impressed me, albeit in different ways.
In the book, Jack is the narrator, which was particularly powerful...since the reader is essentially blind and can only know what Jack describes, you largely have the same amount of knowledge about what is going on as he does for the first half of the story, and slowly put two and two together. Not being told what was explicitly going on was a great driving factor in the book, and Jack's escape was one of the most heart-pounding reading experiences in recent memory. I don't necessarily totally fault the movie for not being able to pull off quite the same experience as the story couldn't be told quite the same way in a visual medium, and obviously knowing the story I already knew what happened. However, I would have loved more shots from Jack's point of view in the movie, maybe even completely from his point of view. The richness and blissful ignorance of Jack's world and the interplay between his inner and outer mind was a very important theme decidedly missing from the film.
However, one aspect of the film I did enjoy was the second half, post-escape. This part of the book I thought paled a bit in comparison to the first..once the reader 'knew' much more than Jack did the story lost something important, in my opinion (in fact, because of this, I thought the book should have ended with their escape) But in the film you got to explore beyond Jack's eyes and this second half is where this mattered most, for example you got to see a much better view of the implications for Jack's mother (helped in no small part by Brie's powerful performance, whose Oscar was well-deserved), and for the pair of them together as they navigate their freedom together, one learning for the first time and other re-learning. The way they presented this part was powerful and inherently had greater depth without the narratorial confines, and I liked it much more than I did in the book.
Overall, although I have to be that annoying person with the obligatory "book was better" comment, I did very much enjoy the film for the reasons stated. It would have been interesting to see it without knowing the story already. I am very glad they brought this beautiful and heart-wrenching story to the big screen - the acting and cinematography was simply superb and young Jacob Tremblay clearly has stardom in his future.