I've never read the F. Scott Fitzgerald story, though I've heard enough about it to know there's no reason for me to. In terms of adapting it into a film, David Fincher has made quite the allegory.
Benjamin Button (Brad Pitt) is born eighty years old and reverts back to infancy, all the while retaining the soul and emotional state of a normal human being. He simply looks old. The script (by Eric Roth) keeps him quiet and Pitt portrays him with a level-headedness that makes you wonder from time to time if he actually is, in fact, as eighty-years-old as he looks, but so far as I can tell, there's a kid in that body.
He grows up in an old folks home. Is this poignant or ironic? The film wishes it were both, and I found the film itself teetered on both. It wants to be poignant, but as long as Button keeps his mouth shut, the emotional resonance is a bit muddled and lost.
Much the same for the direction of the film. As Button grows older, Roth's pen tries to set him on an adventure that's also supposed to be poignant. Everywhere he goes, he finds himself surrounded by lonely people. He's on a boat to Russia with a captain that drinks and reminisces about lost dreams. He begins an affair with Elizabeth Abbot (Tilda Swinton), who stays up nights drinking and reminiscing about... err, lost dreams. He comes home to find Daisy, a girl he knew, has all grown up (and being played by Cate Blanchett). She's doing fine until he shows up, then she has an accident and spends the rest of the film... well, she doesn't really drink much, but she certainly spends her time wishing things had turned out differently.
And because our "hero" is only at home around lonely people, as soon as she makes the best of things by getting pregnant and starting a dance studio, he comes up with a reason to leave so the whole "old man loneliness" thing can continue.
This film is the flip-side of Roth's earlier "follow-a-life" melodrama Forrest Gump. Where Gump was a "forever child" no matter how old he got and managed to constantly surround himself with "progress" and moving forward and people who were always looking ahead and planning for the future, Button is a "forever senior citizen" no matter how young he looks and manages to constantly surround himself with people that have seen better days. Both have lifelong loves that can't relate to them, and only seek them out in desperation. Both end in a touch of sadness. Where Forrest Gump reaches the level of poignancy that tugs at your heartstrings (Gump grows up to an extent with a heavy price), Button never really grows young as he could have. Instead, he disappears for a spell just when his life (and the movie) could have really become interesting.
I kept wishing that we had followed Diasy. Pitt's Button is a curious character, but not an interesting one. Blanchett's Daisy is far more interesting, and her storyline would've made for a better film, IMHO. Fincher/Roth/Pitt wants us to treat Button like a case study, when there's nothing to study beyond the shallow. And the shallow end of things (the look of the film) is expert and without reproach. It's the rest of the film that, while certainly not being horrible, is still found wanting.
7.66/10
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