the lovely bones – movie

wow.  good gracious.  that was awesome.  can i first say that the casting was utterly perfect.  who knew marky mark could act?  or at least show that much emotion?  and emotion is one thing that the actors didn’t hold back on.  i love it when actors really cry when they’re supposed to cry instead of just making pouty unhappy faces 😦  and they weren’t just crying.  they showed anguish and it was beautifully and tragically done.  saoirse ronan (pronounced seer-sha) as susie salmon is breathtaking.  i knew saoirse was the ish after seeing “atonement” and “city of ember”.  she’s my new hero.  she was completely unafraid to embrace the entire spectrum of emotion that the story requires.

and reece ritchie who plays ray singh was a perfect match.  in the few moments that he interacts with saoirse in the movie, he completely captured the fact that ray was in love with susie.  ray’s feelings for susie could have easily lacked the depth it had in the book but reece pulled it off in a way that made me cry.  we should all be so lucky.  the way the movie progressed had me concerned about the part where susie inhabits ruth’s body and finally looses her virginity to ray.  but peter jackson (in all your wisdom, i bow to thee) decided that in the movie version ray and susie would not kiss before she died, instead susie would possess ruth to finally get that first kiss from ray.  it wasn’t lacking in the least.  the rape was not shown at all which was another thing i was concerned about.  what happened during susie’s brutal murder was implied, which made it all the more deceptive and disgusting.

susan sarandon as susie’s grandmother was a breath of fresh air, just as the character is in the book.  brilliant acting.  i’m already comfortable seeing rachel weisz in roles like she played in “the constant gardener” and “definitely, maybe” so i felt she captured the intelligent and untamed nature of susie’s mother wonderfully.  and is stanley tucci creepy or what?!  those fake teeth and that comb over do wonders.

the movie is also beautiful to look at.  the effects were appropriate and blended seamlessly with the story line (although tons of people disagree).  and the music wasn’t afraid to get crazy.  it was effective in a way that amplified your perception of the scene.  saoirse’s voiceover was done perfectly to help narrate through the passing of time.  not even a trace of her irish accent.  she’s amazing.  especially when she delivers the line “these were the lovely bones that had grown around my absence: the connections — sometimes tenuous, sometimes made at great cost, but often magnificent — that happened after I was gone.”  made me cry.  sappy me.

my eyes burned fiercely through the movie.  i’m not kidding when i say that reece ritchie plays a mean ray singh.  when he delivers one of my favorite lines “you are beautiful, susie salmon” i cried every time.  and yes, he gives the line more than once, yay for kleenex.  and the ending when susie reaches her ultimate destination and meets the other victims…no words…just tears.

thank you peter jackson for staying true to the book, as you always do.  and the liberties you took were perfect and no less genius than your previous adaptations (minus the king kong remake).