(andPOP) - I don't like horror movies. I don't mind violence, but only as a means to an end, and in horror movies violence is the end. I don't see the entertainment value in watching people getting shot, cut, stabbed and chopped for no apparent reason. Taking the Mars Attacks route - making the characters jerks - just leaves me with the same feeling as going to a bar and spending two hours with real jerks - I have better things to do, why am I wasting my time here?
That said, I realize many people don't like animation. They aren't engaged by computer-generated images or moving drawings, and have a hard time identifying with anthropomorphic animals or inanimate objects. They associate the medium either with mediocre family entertainment or a base level of humour - which, unfortunately, much if it is - and dismiss it outright. And for all that it remains one of my favourite genres.
Many people - and almost all critics - similarly loathe a certain type of mass-market, broadly comic, dramatic, or romantic confection, the kind whose screenplay is "written" when the screenwriter fills in certain blanks, the director hires certain stars, the producers put together a prepackaged campaign, and everyone at the studio watches the money roll in.
August Rush is one such confection. Whether I like it or not is irrelevant - the IMDB calls it "a drama with fairy tale elements," and you've probably seen the trailer (if you haven't, click
here). Both sell the movie perfectly. Either you'll think it's a heartwarming story of a kid reuniting with his long-lost parents and a testament to the power of music, or you'll think it's another pile of sentimental claptrap starring Robin Williams. Both judgments are equally correct.
To those who believe they will like it, I offer my humble critic's opinion: while the music (by Mark Mancina) is excellent, it is only August (Freddie Highmore) and the Wizard (Williams) who seem truly moved by the power of music - except for one scene, I did not glean a similar sense of enjoyment from the parents (Keri Russell and Jonathan Rhys Meyers). Also, the movie either overdoes its real-life elements or underplays its fairy tale elements - there are far too many
coincidences for the former and not enough magic for the latter. Perhaps if young August had been interested in fairy tales in the first place the unrealistic elements would have seemed less out of place, but there's no point in crying over spilt milk, is there?
To those who would rather have their eyes gouged out it is indeed everything you feared it would be, with a typical borderline lunatic performance by Williams; further proof he should stick to material where you're meant to hate him.
While I'm not typically a fan of dramatic confectionery, August Rush is built around three of my favourite themes - music, fairy tales and the relationship between kids and their parents - and I'll see anything except R.V. with Robin Williams. It'll probably end up on my shelf next to Music of the Heart and The Mighty, two other personal favourites which could be seen as sentimental claptrap, and which happen to incorporate music and are suitable family films.
