Nostalgic and very well told

Rating: 7/10 (6 March 2012)

Some friends in a little town. A bunch of kids faced to a completely unimaginable situation. A small city isolated by a strange happening. The military taking over. The sweet smell of distant childhood as remembered by sensitive ones. A movie within a movie (or maybe "a dream within a dream", Poe dixit). Tell you something? Yeah, there are a few specialist on these matters. John Carpenter in "Village of the Damned", "The Fog", "Christine", Stephen King ("It", "The Stand", "The Body", "Duma Key" and a million et ceteras) and Steven Spielberg ("Jaws", "Close Encounters of the Third Kind", "E.T."). And so on. All of them share a very personal view about the reality: the world is a strange, hostile place to live in, and the only way is the group, call it friendship, loyalty or love, but the group anyway.
This movie is about just that: a bunch of friends, young kids in a journey of knowledge, a ritual of manhood, an unbelievable event that force them to grow up, to mature, to start giving value to thinks they never thought about before.
J.J. Abrams (without any shame or guilt, because this film is just about this) develops a powerful tale of love and friendship among an apocalyptic chaos, unleashed in a small village by an unprecedented event. But the story isn't about the event, but our society and the way we raise our children.
If you look carefully (or even casually at all), you'll quickly see that, smartly enough, Abrams switches parts from the very beginning: all the kids behavior like grownups, with decision and intelligent thinking, and all the adults do the very opposite: they are selfish, childish, totally unfocused on those things that really matters.
And when the chaos menaces lives and the happiness of everyone, the one and only solution rises from beyond the hard feelings and confusion, and then the climax claims its terrain.
Mr. Abrams gives his tribute to, yes, "E.T.", yes, "Stand by me" and even "Close Encounters" as many editors correctly pointed out in other reviews, and, more noticeably, to John Carpenter (look for the underground sequence and tell me if you didn't expect to find Dr. Blair down there, if you know what I mean) and George Romero, all of them films, books and artists who share the same vision about life, collaboration and love. And, homage after homage in visuals, SFX and score, builds a movie of pure entertainment, a story of passion and emotion, and a big moral about the dangers of power and moral descent.
The movie is a very enjoyable experience for all audiences, and a very spectacular one indeed, despite some over-the-top CGIs (the train, mainly).
Embedded in this great script and direction, you will find some real gems: those two miracles of non-methodic (in the sense of not committing with Stanislavski-Grotowski Actor's Studio acting method), negative performances (the excellent and ever-focused child actors Elle Fanning and Joel Courtney), an amazing beauty (Amanda Michalka) and the promising future star (yes, we can foresee that) Riley Griffiths as the kid who directs the movie within the movie (which results you'll can appreciate along the end credits).
Watch, also, for the miraculous Fanninng's performance in the train station, immediately previous to the train's entering.
Worth seeing: You bet your life.