All heart, no head.... or all head, no heart

Rating: 5/10 (1 January 2009)

Well, here is a film I was nervous about seeing. I am a huge fan of David Fincher. I love Fight Club, Seven and Zodiac most of all. The Game, Panic Room and Alien3 are pretty good too. He is my kind of director, cold to the touch but a master of precision storytelling. Zodiac in particular was an astonishing film and left me giddy with the sense that I'd found a modern Kubrick and I couldn't wait to hear about his next project. But Benjamin Button is not what I expected at all. It is as if Kubrick suddenly decided that he wanted to make a film about a boy called Elliot and an alien called E.T. Just, a complete change. I decided a while ago that I would always follow David Fincher's films closely but from the earliest discussions, something didn't feel quite right. It just didn't feel like, his field.
Now, having just come back from this 3 hour epic, I can reluctantly admit that my earlier worries were well placed. The film is certainly not without merit, in fact individual scenes and moments sparkle with a magic rarely seen in films nowadays and could only have been delivered by a perfect blend of writing, direction and performance. However there is something essentially unsettling and unfulfilling about Benjamin Button as a whole and unfortunately, these issues must take center stage.
When I mentioned Kubrick and E.T. I was close but not exactly so. Benjamin Button has much more in common with Spielberg's flawed A.I. There was a director of warm sentimentality attempting to tell a bitter story and moving in the cold world created by Kubrick. The end result had the feeling of someone attempting to fit his size eleven feet into size nine shoes and the style and story did not blend with the heart. With Benjamin Button, we have a director who has found his cinematic voice in cynicism, chaos and obsession, attempting to tell a story, albeit it a strange and surreal one, of life and love.
However the film when viewed as a whole actually feels devoid of theme. What lesson are we supposed to take from it? Is it about love? I guess. Is it about life? Well, obviously. But what about life? Rather it comes off as a meticulous exercise in following the inevitable process of aging. As such, the film avoids forcing any dramatic situations and rather flies from place to place, through the years, as we encounter our characters getting younger or older as the case may be. Therein lies the problem, the shoe doesn't fit the foot. While there were certainly parts of the film that plucked the heartstrings, particularly the final scene, for the most part I had the overwhelming sense that I was watching characters I didn't care for and a director without a message. Important encounters would fly by and I was left with the impression of Fincher missing the sentimental mark, or rather scenes didn't seem to have any greater meaning or point. Rather, the audience responds to the astonishing sight of Brad Pitt as a young geriatric or those moments when Pitt's voice-over combined with the right piano keys causes the eyes to inexplicably start to leak salty liquid. Tonally, Benjamin Button wanted to be Road To Perdition and I think Sam Mendes might have been the man for the job.
On the plus, Brad Pitt plays the part perfectly and Cate Blanchett was a revelation for me. It is their scenes together that work best. The awkwardness of a mature man in a young body and an immature girl in a young body is a touching realization of the nature of growing up differently. The film also looks beautiful, the world is vivid and alive and Fincher's talent ensures that eerie yellows rooms, icy blue skies and dark, shadowy faces make up for the lack of emotional clarity. In conclusion, Benjamin Button is a unique experiment, which fails to blend into a decisive whole.