The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008) Film Review

Plot Summary - Odd and interesting fantasy/romance about Benjamin Button (Brad Pitt), born in New Orleans as a baby who is an old man in his eighties but tiny like a baby (and looking pretty darn weird, I must say). His mother dead from child birth, Benjamin is abandoned by his father on the front porch of an old age home, where a black woman who works there adopts him as her own. Benjamin starts his life with all the ailments of an old person - at first he's got wrinkles, arthritis, rickety bones, sags and bags, balding head, and walks with a cane, but as he gradually gets older in years - he gets younger and more and more handsome physically!! A strange concept indeed - yet how intriguing! The romance - - Benjamin first meets Daisy (grown-up Daisy played by Cate Blanchett) when she is visiting her grandmother at the home - she a little girl, he a very old man, but they develop a life-long bond of friendship with love - and passion - to come, as his and her ages gradually meet in the middle, you could say.

Review - I enjoyed this close to three hour film - the film begins just after World War I and progresses to the current day. The story is related by character Daisy, now an old woman on her death bed, to her daughter (Julia Ormond) via a diary that was written by Benjamin. I enjoyed the way the period elements were done in this film - realistic costumes and time period feel helped draw me into each elapsing decade as Benjamin grows younger and younger. A few of the scenes were filmed to look like old film footage. Loved the Scott Joplin music, used in a few scenes (I love ragtime!). Rating - 10/10 stars

Burn After Reading (2008) Film Review

Watched this one on Monday.

Plot Summary - Dark comedy about a just-fired CIA agent, Osbourne Cox (John Malkovich), who begins to write his "memoirs", loses the disc at local gym "Hardbodies", which is then found by gym employees. Employee Linda (Frances McDormand) is a middle-aged woman busy doing Internet dating and "re-inventing" her life - she needs money for several plastic surgeries she's gung-ho to get. Employee Chad (Brad Pitt) is a musclehead gym boy with not a lot of brain power. Linda and Chad decide to try to get a reward from Cox for the return of what they believe to be secret and important CIA documents. Everything seems to backfire on them though, as they progress to trying to get money from the Russians for the disc, stuff like that. Meanwhile a marshal named Harry (George Clooney) is having an affair with Cox wife, but that doesn't stop him from meeting women on the Internet.

Review - All the different characters and stories seem to mix together in this film in a way you would think would be confusing, but actually was easy to follow. Quite good, I found John Malkovich to be pretty amusing in this. Rating - 8.5/10 stars