Life may be measured in moments, as the tagline for "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" reads. But I definitely measured the film in minutes - all 168 of them. While watching the film, I felt nostalgic for life despite the fact that I am decades away from middle age. Yes, the tale will stir up feelings and tears, but nothing will be learned. This "Curious Case" missed its mark and made me quite perturbed.
Benjamin Button (Brad Pitt) is born under unusual circumstances. He is born with medical defects that don't usually appear until the end of life; yet he is an infant. Instead of aging naturally, Benjamin becomes younger with time, and experiences all the tribulations that one would think a man aging backward would experience. For instance, he copes with living in an old, rigid body while his brain has a 7-year-old's intellect.
Around his hormone-driven years, Benjamin meets the young girl Daisy (Cate Blanchet). Their love story remains the central plot throughout the nearly three-hour-long film. While Daisy's daughter reads Benjamin's diary as her mother lays in hospice, the audience watches the story of Benjamin's life unfold.
Pitt's portrayal of Benjamin is passive, in which he quietly observes life whizzing by without any apparent reaction to events. When word of the Pearl Harbor attack reaches Benjamin, he makes a moronic facial expression, as if someone had told him a joke he didn't understand.
"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" ends without explaining a purpose for its creation. Are you supposed to pity Benjamin for his circumstance? Do you learn from his trials? Do you program your brain to prepare for the eventual end? Should you even ask questions? I did. I wondered about how my existence will end, what will define me at the precipice of life and how many hours it took makeup and visual effect gurus to cover up Pitt's chiseled cheekbones. In the end, I was left frustrated for its message, or lack thereof.
Perhaps Eric Roth, the Oscar-winning writer of "Forrest Gump" and this screenplay, aimed to evoke sadness from his audience, but to purposely centralize a plot around the sadness of aging and death is heinous. People must be fiercely reminded that the other feelings life provides overpower grief: laughter, joy, wonder, love and the emotions that haven't yet been named.
Fitzgerald wrote "A Curious Case of Benjamin Button" to show the importance of maintaining a youthful curiosity about life in one's old age. The only attempt made to address the book's main lesson occurred when Daisy's daughter asked her dying mother if she was afraid. "I'm curious," the elderly woman replied. Well, so are the rest of us. So what?
During the credits of the book's film adaption, I was more confused than curious. Confused about why I had given time out of my life to watch a movie about one man's life without taking anything away but despondency about death. This film will likely win awards and be widely esteemed by those who adore its external beauty. The film has already received 13 noinations, including best picture. However, I can't respect it - life's too short.
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