Oscar-aesthetics overshadow what could have been a thought provoking story

Rating: 6/10 (26 March 2009)

Before I start, I have to say one thing: The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button" goes on for long enough that it won't leave you completely cold if you've made it all the way to the end. However, the movie drags on too much. Very often I found myself wishing that the story would move along quicker and I couldn't wait for Pitt's character to get younger and finally die.
Maybe, "Benjamin Button" was just too conventional for my taste. The score, the cinematography, the lines of dialog (which are incredibly clichéd and humdrum in certain parts) all seemed to scream: Please, please Academy. Give us the Golden Statue!" Even though I wasn't much of a fan of Slumdog Millionaire", at least that movie had its own original aesthetics and wasn't a run-of-the-mill Oscar-nominee.
Speaking of a lack of originality: Am I the only one who sees more than just a few parallels to Forrest Gump"? Benjamin Button is the gentle Outcast who experiences all sorts of adventures through the years, one of them on a ship, not unlike Forrest on his shrimp boat. There he meets a captain, not too different from Lieutenant Dan. Benjamin has this erratic love interest in Cate Blanchett's character, just like Gump has in Jenny. The movie has a reoccuring symbol (the bluebird), as does Forrest Gump" (the feather), and the Life is like a box of chocolate: You never know what you're gonna get"-catchphrase here is You never know what's comin' for ya" and so on and so forth. More than just a few similarities, if you ask me.
This definitely doesn't mean that Benjamin Button" is completely worthless. It has some nice ideas (the aforementioned bluebird as a symbol for infinity, the clock that's running backwards) and the screenplay is clever, but all in all the kitschy cinematography, the dramatic setting with Hurricane Katrina waiting to happen, all of that is just a bit too glossy and conventional for me.