Review by Michael Jaffe
The best thing I think a person can say about a film and its maker are regarding how carefully someone made every precise thing in the movie perfect, and there simply isn’t a false moment in this epic fairy tale that is more about living than love, despite its romantic overtones. David Fincher may be an asshole but he can direct the shit out of a movie, even a movie that takes longer to watch than it takes to read the short story on which it was so loosely based.
Really, I could try to wax poetic in an epic summary of the absolutely jaw dropping details, or about how Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett loose themselves so heavily in their characters that for the first half of the film I didn’t realize that Brad Pitt the celebrity was in this movie. The details, from the wear on the watches to the freckles on the back of Mrs. Blanchett, are so exact that it really is too much to take in after a single viewing. While the films intensity may cause it to be draining for me to try to see the film again, I really am going to will myself to watch it again because there are likely so many things that I missed, so many layers and subtexts to the general theme, that I am likely to never get bored while watching it. A truly incredible display of filmmaking, this cinematic masterpiece will likely take decades to truly settle into its role as a member of the Hollywood canon.
10/10
