The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

If the natural order of maturity reverses, and a man can be born old and die young—at least physically—what would his life be like?

Enter Benjamin Button, a charming character who looks older than your grandfather when he was seven and a cute little boy in his 60s. Adapted from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s short story of the same title, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button narrates the absurdity of his daily life in this premise. And yes, it’s quite long.

You can expect some dragging scenes but the there’s a touch of grace and subtleness in director David Fincher’s treatment. He focuses more on the setting and the characters, even the minor ones. They make this movie worth sitting through until the end. (I specifically like the man who got struck by lightning.)

However, I would like to cite some important scenes that were not given the running time these deserve, which thus makes the film lack depth. I’m sorry to say that there seems to be little on-screen chemistry between Benjamin (Brad Pitt) and Daisy (Cate Blanchett).

Pitt’s cold acting also gets tiring sometimes. Don’t get me wrong. I like Brad Pitt in the beginning but my fascination stops when I see him in his dashing middle-aged scenes. Yes, this is the part where he was at his most drool-worthy state.

Benjamin and Daisy’s love story starts a bit creepy, develops timidly, and ends sadly. You anticipate it to end depressingly but you’ll be surprised that it ends the way it does.

But the production design is amazing and meticulously detailed. I was surprised to see a can of oatmeal with the old label in the background.

You should watch it not just because it stars Brad Pitt or you’re curious about how he looks when he ages. It’s an inspiring touching movie, completely different Forrest Gump, the screenplay of which was also written by Eric Roth.

Achingly ironic, lush, and funny, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is one of the movies you should watch–at least once–in your lifetime.

The Verdict: Yes, it’s worth your hard-earned pesos.

Synopsis:

“I was born under unusual circumstances.” And so begins ‘The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,’ adapted from the 1920s story by F. Scott Fitzgerald about a man who is born in his eighties and ages backwards: a man, like any of us, who is unable to stop time. We follow his story, set in New Orleans from the end of World War I in 1918 to the 21st century, following his journey that is as unusual as any man’s life can be.

On the day that Hurricane Katrina hits New Orleans, elderly Daisy Williams nee Fuller is on her deathbed in a New Orleans hospital. At her side is her adult daughter, Caroline. Daisy asks Caroline to read to her aloud the diary of Daisy’s lifelong friend, Benjamin Button. Benjamin’s diary recounts his entire extraordinary life, the primary unusual aspect of which was his aging backwards, being born an old man who was diagnosed with several aged diseases at birth and thus given little chance of survival, but who does survive and gets younger with time. Abandoned by his biological father, Thomas Button, after Benjamin’s biological mother died in childbirth, Benjamin was raised by Queenie, a black woman and caregiver at a seniors home. Daisy’s grandmother was a resident at that home, which is where she first met Benjamin. Although separated through the years, Daisy and Benjamin remain in contact throughout their lives, reconnecting in their forties when in age they finally match up. Some of the revelations in Benjamin’s diary are difficult for Caroline to read, especially as it relates to the time past this reconnection between Benjamin and Daisy, when Daisy gets older and Benjamin grows younger into his childhood years.

Directed by David Fincher and starring Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett with Taraji P. Henson, Tilda Swinton, Jason Flemyng, Elias Koteas and Julia Ormond, Benjamin Button is a grand tale of a not-so-ordinary man and the people and places he discovers along the way, the loves he finds, the joys of life and the sadness of death, and what lasts beyond time.