Movie Review - The Lovely Bones (2009)

The Lovely Bones
Starring Mark Wahlberg, Rachel Weisz, Susan Sarandon, Stanley Tucci, Michael Imperioli, and Saoirse Ronan
Directed by Peter Jackson

What Dreams May Come, Part II. In that movie, Robin Williams gets stuck in a purgatory-esque land between heaven and earth, and The Lovely Bones contains the same premise, more or less.

Right from the beginning we learn that young 14-year-old Susie Salmon (Ronan) has been murdered and that one of her neighbors (Tucci) is her killer. The rest of the movie swaps back and forth between Susie's dream-like visions of "the in-between" and her father's (Wahlberg) search for his daughter's killer.

Unfortunately, this movie just plain doesn't work. Granted, I've only seen the first Lord of the Rings movie, but I couldn't help but wonder why the heck this guy was so acclaimed. This movie was full of odd cuts and edits, a mishmash of nonsensical heavenly visions, and some of the oddest score and background music I've heard in a 2009 movie (I realize most don't even "hear" that, but the score is an important part to my movie-going experience).

Jackson (who also co-wrote the script) poorly directs his actors and doesn't really allow us to connect with Susie's family at all. The relationship between Susie's mother (Weisz) and father is nonexistent. Sorry, Peter, but showing them making love at the beginning isn't enough to make me believe they're actually in love...I never once felt any type of connection between Weisz and Wahlberg and their feelings for each other play a fairly important role in the film. It doesn't help that Walhberg's mopey "blahness" is utterly boring to view.

Saoirse Ronan's Susie is just too darn bright, wide-eyed, and cheery for a girl who has just been murdered. I found the character and her overbearing voiceover to simply be annoying. And speaking of annoying, the stock comedic character of Susie's grandmother (played over-the-top by Susan Sarandon) was horrendous. While she brought some much needed entertainment to this overly heavy production, she seemed like she belonged in a sitcom. For this, I don't blame Sarandon, but instead fault Mr. Jackson.

Stanley Tucci's murderous George Harvey is fine, as is Rose McIver as Susie's younger sister, Lindsey, but they're not enough to tip the scales to the positive in the acting department.

Admittedly, there are moments in this film that work. The scenes of Susie's murder and Lindsey's discovery of some pivotal evidence are racked with tension. And it was moments like those that make it a shame that Jackson and his co-writers bogged this thing down with ridiculous meta-physical mumbo jumbo.

The RyMickey Rating: D+