Today, I eagerly raced to my mailbox to retrieve my latest Netflix flick - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I've been very curious about this movie and all the Oscar buzz it generated and today I got the chance to see if it lives up to its reputation and I must say that it does to an extent - a very different love story. Not sure if it was the face that it was nearing my bed time but I found it a tad long.
The movie starts in a hospital where an old woman is on her deathbed with her daughter beside her. She requests that her daughter read to her from an old diary. It turns out that the diary belongs to Benjamin Button who was abandoned the day he was born and taken in by a young black woman Queenie who works for an old people's home. Benjamin Button was born old and starts "aging" in reverse. What follows through the movie is the story of his extraordinary life.
The story starts off a little slow. Benjamin is a kid but looks like an old man and seems to blend in at the Senior home. He soon makes a friend when Daisy comes to visit her grandma who lives at the same Senior home. What follows then are a series of incidents in Benjamin's life that bring him various experiences - all the while he crosses paths with Daisy at different parts in their lives, finally meeting in the middle.
Cate Blanchett is simply luminous - there's no other word for it - and essays her part well. Brad Pitt is good in this role. There's a scene on the sailboat where, in his sunglasses, he looks heart-stoppingly gorgeous. The makeup is a true standout in this film - whether it is making Cate Blanchett look 20 something and then age progressively, or make Taraji P. Henson look realistically old (I've always wondered about Taraji's name - did her mother know an Indian woman named Tara, who was addressed with respect as 'Taraji' and thought that to be a name? - anyway, I digress...) or of course make Brad Pitt look so alarmingly old and amazingly young again.
My two cents? All in all, I would give it 3 stars - worth a watch for sure.
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