Sunday, November 27, 2011

You Get What You Pay For

Review: We Bought A Zoo

Director Cameron Crowe has tricked me! I went into a sneak preview of We Bought A Zoo (opening Dec. 23rd) expecting a simple, cheesy kid’s movie. Instead the film proved to be a heart-felt drama in disguise. The movie centers on Matt Damon’s character Benjamin Mee who tries to start a new life for his two kids, brooding Dylan (Colin Ford) and adorable Rosie (Maggie Elizabeth Jones), by moving to a new house, which also happens to be a zoo. Of course, the purchase of the house stipulates that the new owner must care for the animals. And the only way to pay for all the animals food, shelter, and medical costs is to re-open the zoo, an idea which is going to take a lot of work to accomplish. Benjamin says it’s a modern day adventure!

Animals are always fun and the ones we meet in this film are no exception. Bears and snakes get loose, peacocks have babies, and monkeys make funny faces. But beneath this facade of silliness, real drama comes out. Obviously, they’re in way over their heads in preparing the zoo for the inspection preceding opening day. Benjamin can’t seem to get over the recent loss of his wife or connect with his even more troubled son. In fact, the scene of their climactic confrontation was refreshing and surprising, showing the acting chops of both Matt Damon and Colin Ford. In a movie that had the potential to be ultra-goofy, kinda like Kevin James' recent Zookeeper, We Bought A Zoo has real depth and truly makes you feel for the characters.

While Benjamin and Dylan struggle to move forward, Rosie is the charming light of the film, proving to be a joyful and optimistic child well beyond her years. Scarlett Johansen also creates a wonderfully quirky head zookeeper in her character, Kelly Foster. And while Elle Fanning’s got talent, no doubt about it, this isn’t her strongest performance.

The one thing that bothered me about the film was that we never truly got a sense of how big the zoo was. We were told 13 acres, but I want to be given a bigger tour to help me realize what the characters are really fighting for. For example, there are apparently wolves at the zoo, but we don’t see them until almost the end. When they showed up the entire audience aww’d. We wish we had seen the wolves earlier!

Then again, the somewhat glanced over problems of the zoo are secondary to the inner, personal problems we journey with the characters to conquer. 20th Century Fox wants We Bought A Zoo to be an Oscar contender. I don’t think it will stand a chance in the “Best Picture” category, but if anything Matt Damon’s got a decent shot at the “Best Actor” award, I suppose. Ultimately, this is a great film for the whole family (even though it has a surprising amount of cursing for a PG movie) that has the depth and heart than many other, more childish movies lack, and a great message as well: "To change the world, all it takes is 20 seconds of courage."

The Final Word: Go buy a ticket.

1 comment:

  1. hey, i just saw the movie, and i agree! well worth the time and money. was definitely surprised by the depth of the issues. i thought they portrayed the visions of the mother without making it seem like he was crazy/ hallucinating. seemed true to the grief process! and overall, i loved it. the animals were sensational!

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