For a melodrama concerned with emotional pain, this fairy tale favours formal trickery over human connection to a fault.
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:33
Fresh:26
Rotten:7
Average Rating:7.2/10
Consensus: Curious Case of Benjamin Button is an epic fantasy tale with rich storytelling backed by fantastic performances.
Australian Theatrical Release:
Dec 26, 2008 Wide
US Box Office: $127,490,802
Synopsis: At once epic in scope and intimate in detail, David Fincher's THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON is certainly the director's most emotional film to date (though FIGHT CLUB and SEVEN don't offer... At once epic in scope and intimate in detail, David Fincher's THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON is certainly the director's most emotional film to date (though FIGHT CLUB and SEVEN don't offer much in the way of competition). Loosely based on an F. Scott Fitzgerald story, this romantic drama tells the tale of Benjamin Button (Brad Pitt), born in 1918 in New Orleans as a baby with wrinkles, cataracts, and arthritis. Benjamin will age backwards, getting younger as he watches those around him growing older. Included in that group are his adoptive mother, Queenie (Taraji P. Henson), and Daisy (Cate Blanchett), the love of his life whom he meets when she is just a little girl and he is an old man. They age in reverse, but despite Benjamin's globe-trotting adventures, their lives repeatedly intersect. The script from Oscar winner Eric Roth bears more than a few hallmarks in common with his earlier work on FORREST GUMP: both adaptations cross decades and continents. But BENJAMIN's script or even the fine acting aren't its most impressive accomplishment; the technology--both CGI and makeup--used to make Benjamin and Daisy age are remarkable, and makes the film entirely believable, but they're certainly aided by fine performances from both Pitt and Blanchett. The triumph of technology only serves to underscore the beauty of this film and of the love story at its heart. [More]
Starring: Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Taraji P. Henson, Tilda Swinton
Starring: Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Taraji P. Henson, Tilda Swinton, Jason Flemyng, Elias Koteas, Julia Ormond, Elle Fanning
Director: David Fincher
Director: David Fincher
Screenwriter: Eric Roth
Producer: Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall, Cean Chaffin
Composer: Alexandre Desplat
Studio: Paramount Pictures
Reviews for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
It's a speculative and enthralling fantasy about what it would be like to age in reverse.
This is a beautifully made film ... but ... it is also a piece of cinematic artifice, in which the manufacture of it stands between it and us -- big on novelty and sentimentality but short on tension and interest for the audience
It's a speculative and enthralling fantasy about what it would be like to age in reverse.
Remove "curious" from the title and replace it with "twee and pointless", and you're close to it. What a incredible shaggy-puppy of a movie, a cobweb-construction patched together with CGI, prosthetics, gibberish and warm tears.
Aptly for a film so concerned with time, Button is 13 minutes shy of three hours and just flies by. If this is Fincher selling out, can he sell out more often please?
It is a tedious marathon of smoke and mirrors. In terms of the basic requirements of three-reel drama the film lacks substance, credibility, a decent script and characters you might actually care for.
The A-list cheekbones, CGI wow factor and sensous cinematography can't save it. This is Hollywood at full bluster -- spectacular and sometimes iconic, but emotionally half baked.
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button leaves you colder than it should, and it shouldn't leave you cold at all.
The film quickly outgrows any sense of gimmickry and matures into a one-of-a-kind meditation on mortality, time's inexorable passage and the fleeting sweetness of love.
Benjamin Button is little more than Gump by way of Dorian Gray. It plays too safe when it should be letting its freak flag fly.
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button sighs with longing and simmers with intrigue while investigating the philosophical conundrums and emotional paradoxes of its protagonist’s condition.
Given the resources and talent here, quite a movie might have resulted. But it's so hard to care about this story.
The film, ambitious if flawed, also is lyrical and melancholy as it tells the story of a man aging backward.
Latest News for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
May 04, 2009:
RT on DVD: Benjamin Button, Bollywood Kung Fu, and a Special Twilight Set
Award season armchair jockeys should check out a few notable Oscar and Golden Globe contenders this week, including David Fincher's visionary epic film about a man who ages... More...
February 01, 2009:
Slumdog's Danny Boyle Wins DGA Award
Danny Boyle takes home another win for Best Director from the Director's Guild of America -- could Oscar gold be just around the corner? See who else was nominated this year in... More...
January 22, 2009:
Oscar Nominations Announced: Benjamin Button Leads With 13
The Oscar nominations for 2008 have been announced. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button leads with 13 nominations, while The Reader makes a surprisingly strong showing. The Dark... More...
January 15, 2009:
BAFTA Nominations Announced ![]()
The full list of nominations for this year's BAFTA Film Awards. More...
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