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Curious Case
Tuesday, January 20, 2009 @ 10:06 PM

What I dream of is an art of balance. - Henri Matisse

I just saw The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I loved the trailer, and even if my friends didn't hype about the movie (although all of them did), I still would have watched it because, based on the critical consensus, it is a good film. And it was nominated for five Golden Globes, which is a plus; and Cate Blanchett is never disappointing.

But I hated it.

I've had my fair share of bad movies before: Twilight, War of the Worlds, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Four Christmases ... Twilight—but now Benjamin Button? I hate to know that a Golden Globe-nominated movie is horrible, but it really, really was.

The most I can say about The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is that it's pretty, and yeah, I literally mean that it's a pretty movie—but of course, the issue is whether or not there's more to the film's aesthetic value. There are scenes in the film that are obviously physically beautiful, like the twilight scenes, ocean scenes, and ballet scenes—and heck, Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett aren't bad to look at either—and so at face-value, Benjamin Button was executed perfectly. But if you examine the narrative, it falls completely flat; and what's even more disappointing is that the plot is set in such a promising timeframe: It encompasses two great wars and constantly moves across the Atlantic Ocean, whilst foreshadowing the 2005 Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, but the story just can't be taken on the same great level. The story can't hold up for such a great setting. There's this illogicality and oddity and almost even absurdity to the narrative (and no, I'm not talking about Benjamin Button growing younger) because the events are based too much on mere coincidence that it comes off as shallow, complacent, and overly ambitious. As oppose to an ideal drama, there's sincere depth in the narrative. When you watch The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, the events were already so obviously and flatly predetermined—like you just know who's going to die and everything else that's going to happen that Benjamin Button becomes this lifeless drama, an insubstantial soap opera that you would love to admire as visual art, but not literary or successful cinematic art. Sure the film has great insights and life lessons to be learned, but they don't come off equal to the prettiness of the film. It's like a priest preaching about glorious works of God but they sound utterly boring.

Benjamin Button is a visual achievement, and musical success as well because I did love the scores, but that's it—nothing more and nothing less to that.