Poop Shute

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The above ellipsis is my initial reaction to THE FOUNTAIN. Silence. It was a good two or three minutes into the credits before I even moved.

I was blown away. I won't even begin to describe the story, because it's just too much, and I couldn't do it justice with a few sentences. But you should go see it. And I'm not building it up too much by saying that, because I am not 100% certain I liked it yet. I was definitely blown away, but I'm still digesting it.

The music and the visuals were so strikingly beautiful that I am left with this perpetual feeling that I am about to cry. The tears aren't coming, but it's that feeling like they just might at any second.

Ryan and I have a suspicion that this movie will likely flop financially. It's too cerebral, too slow and too breath-taking to grab John Q. Public's movie-going dollar. Prove me wrong, America, and go see something with substance for once in your fat, jackass-electing lives.
Yeah, I'm an elitist, but that's just because I'm better than you. So nyah!

For those of you who just thought "what a prick," that last bit was an ironic joke.

I have one nit-picky quibble with the director, DARREN ARONOFSKY. He seems to be madly in love with the EXTREME close-up. I mean, it was a whirlwind romance. They met on set, and the two of them just got back from their honey-moon, and let's just say that their may be the pitter-patter of EXTREMELY CLOSE little feet soon in the Aronofsky household.

But seriously.

I think I know what he was going for with it, but at times it just got to be too much. It seems like any time anybody is talking that their face must fill 90% of the frame. The poor set designer must have wept because we rarely ever see his excellent work. A wider shot here and there to elaborate on spatial relationships, the space itself and physical connections between the characters would be nice. Not a whole lot more often, because for the most part, I liked the close-ups. And there were wider shots here and there, but not quite enough for my tastes. Specifically I wanted to see more shots that contained two people sharing dialogue and occupying the same frame.

Hell, who knows, maybe I just hit the reason right there. Maybe the actors were almost never on the lot at the same time, and the close-ups are because they just couldn't shoot frames with two people sharing dialogue. Maybe most of the time HUGH JACKMAN isn't looking at anything but an intern when he is taking our breath away. Maybe RACHEL WEISZ is really aiming all her glowing intensity and earnest warmth at the script supervisor. Perhaps the amazing ELLEN BURSTYN was talking to chalk combined with some swiss cheese and a beard.

5% more group/wider shots would do it for me. Like I said, it's nit-picky.

4.5 out of 5 Poops