| Cast Away |
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| 1/2 |
| Rating: Mixed Distributor: 20th Century Fox MPAA Rating: PG-13 Running Length: 2 hours, 24 minutes Genre: Adventure/Drama Release Date: December 22nd, 2000 Director: Robert Zemeckis Cast: Tom Hanks, Helen Hunt, and Chris Noth |
| Plot: A kind hearted, time management obsessed FedEx employee Chuck Noland (Tom Hanks) is the victim of a plane crash that leaves him stranded on a desert island. The four other passengers on the private FedEx plane die leaving him alone. He finds away to survive, eating seafish and coconuts. He keeps the memory of his girlfriend (Helen Hunt) in hopes he can return to her someday. He uses some FedEx boxes and their contents as resources. He even befriends a Wilson volleyball that was in one of the boxes. He triumphs over challenges like making fire, finding enough food, finding shelter, and finding the will to survive. After four years on the island he makes a raft to escape out of wood and a portable toilet that washed up on shore. He finds however that when he returns to society his life still isn't just a walk in the park. |
| Critique: Cast Away begins with characters whom we care for, and situations for which we sympathize. When Noland crash lands and finds a way to survive on the island the drama is engaging and the storyline is full of enjoyable humor. Robert Zemeckis's direction is top notch. Tom Hanks's performance is believable and very intelligent. However, as the second act approaches the film crashes hard (no pun intended). The island stay is shortened and feels incredibally brief. Noland's return to reality is a huge disappointment. It is full of stale dialogue, and tedious moral lessons. The ending is weak and again too brief. The whole film feels as if every major element was shortened and cut to hasty summaries. Although the films is almost two and one half hours long, it is not paced correctly and thusly feels choppy. There is nothing at the end of the road for the audience to enjoy, and we feel we never really got to know Chuck Noland. I sincerely believe Tom Hanks is one of the most talented and successful actors around, and has made some great films. However, his performance in this film was barely above average. What makes me angry is that he will get a lot of praise for this film only because he lost so much weight during the film. People like John Cusack from High Fidelity will get overshadowed. Cast Away reminded me a lot of Wonder Boys because both films ruined successful premises. It ends only as a waste of talent, and another overblown 2000 film that never quite makes it to the climax that I expected. I do not recommend this film. review by supernothingman |
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| picture above from www.castawaymovie.com |