4.5 out of 5 stars
Family appropriateness rating: 4.8 out of 5 stars
Rated PG-13
-One scene of war violence. Someone gets shot, and a little blood from the gunshot wound is shown.
-Some minor action-violence near the end.
-A very light PG-13 rating. I actually thought it was PG.
"The Giver" takes full advantage of the visual, film medium to tell a thought-provoking story about why diversity is important.
The story is set in a post-apocalyptic city where everyone sees black and white. Their function is to obey rules set by the Elders that make everyone completely equal. There is no pain, no suffering and no poverty. There is also no joy, no happiness and no knowledge. The people in this society think they are happy, but that is because they are ignorant of what life has to offer.
When the citizens of this city reach a certain age -- at about the start of puberty -- they are told what their profession is. The Elders watch them from infancy and know what career they are best suited for.
The main character, Jonas (Brenton Thwaites), is assigned to be "The Receiver." His job is to receive the memories of the past, before the post-apocalyptic world. Everyday, the memories are passed to him by the former Receiver, who calls himself The Giver (Jeff Bridges).
What The Giver gives is more than just information. Jonas learns the emotions of the past and starts to see that the world before was much better than the world now. People are content with what they have because they have been told that they can only be happy in their little society. Everyone is told that with the good from the past, there comes a lot of misery and pain, which is why they do not want to go back.
Director Phillip Noyce does an excellent job using visuals to tell the story. At the beginning, everything is shot in black and white. One of the major memories of the past is color, which Jonas sees fully by the end. At first, he -- as well as the audience -- only sees a little bit: the first color is red, which is beautifully contrasted with the black and white. As the story progresses, more and more color is shown.
The way it is shot becomes more complex near the end. Every scene with Jonas is shot in full color, while scenes without him are only in black and white. There is another character, who starts to vaguely see color while coming to an understanding of what is going on.
Jeff Bridges is perfect as The Giver. He portrays the character with a sense of broken wisdom. It is clear that living in this world with the knowledge he has is a great burden to bear.
I would not be surprised to see Brenton Thwaites, the young actor playing Jonas, start becoming more popular in the future. At the beginning, he and his friends are two-dimensional without very much emotion, and the way they speak is always formal. However, as the story goes on, Thwaites does a great job conveying the emotions -- both positive and negative -- that comes with learning how life is supposed to be.
This film is very underrated. On Rotten Tomatoes, it has a 30%, which means that out of all the reviews that have been coming in by major critics, only that percentage liked it. The general synopsis is that it does not explore this world or the depth of the novel very well. I admit to have never read the book. Seeing it as an objective movie-goer, it is engaging, well-written, beautifully-shot and thought-provoking.
There are some details that seem to be omitted by the movie, but these are some minor nitpicks in an overall great film. For one thing, it does not explain what the purpose of having a Receiver is. The Elders want everyone to be ignorant, so why are there two people who know everything? How do the Elders not expect the Giver and Receiver to cause trouble? The film also is not as detailed as it should be about how the society works. Before I saw it, a friend of mine -- who had read the book -- told me that the children are assigned to certain age groups, which is not explained at all in the movie.
Like my Facebook page: www.facebook.com/criticalchristopher
Follow me on Twitter: @ChrisCampbel02
No comments:
Post a Comment