Movie Review - Forever Young

Forever Young (1992)

Starring Mel Gibson, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Elijah Wood

Directed by Steve Miner

***This movie is currently streaming on Netflix***

***Posted as part of the Elijah Wood Early 90s Mini Film Festival***

Schmaltzy and cheesy, Forever Young is a movie that will probably have you rolling your eyes more than once.  But, thanks to decent performances all around, a quick pace, and an overall interesting idea (from a script written by J.J. Abrams, no less), this flick proves to be moderately successful.

The year is 1939 and test pilot Daniel McCormick (Mel Gibson) is about ready to propose to his longtime girlfriend.  Unfortunately, he chickens out and mere seconds after she leaves, she is hit by a car and falls into a coma.  Devastated, Danny turns to his best friend (George Wendt), a scientist for the Army, who has crafted a cryogenic machine that can successfully freeze (and then unfreeze) a person.  Feeling like he has no reason to live, Danny agrees to be a guinea pig for the experiment.  Cut to 1992 and Nat Cooper (Elijah Wood) and his friend uncover the machine and accidentally open it up, allowing Danny to wake up.  Needless to say, things are a bit different in the 90s than they were in the 30s and Danny must both adjust to a new world and attempt to find the reason he's been kept frozen for so long.

Although it's certainly odd, Mel Gibson sells the difficult role.  His wide-eyed childlike innocence when he awakens from his frozen slumber is spot-on at times.  Elijah Wood is also quite good here.  He's allowed to play a normal kid and sometimes that's difficult to do.  There's nothing special for him to do here, but he plays "normal" very well.  Jamie Lee Curtis as Nat's mom is also pleasant to watch.  None of these three actors do anything remotely extraordinary, but they all do fine jobs with what they're given.

Forever Young certainly isn't great, but it moves along surprisingly briskly -- if this film were done nowadays it would've been 130 minutes as opposed to 100.  It's silly and the ending is super sugary sweet, but it's a perfectly acceptable romance with just enough of a different tone to make it watchable.

The RyMickey Rating:  C