The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

From a male perspective, every so often we hear the name of the next “dreamy” actor, and the inevitable conclusion is that he is an actor in name only, used primarily to swoon women and their pocketbooks. About 90% of the time, this initial male reaction is dead on. In the case of Brad Pitt, it could not be more wrong. And The Curious Case of Benjamin Button gives ample opportunity for the star to show his entire range (except the brilliant goofiness displayed in Burn After Reading), starting with his make-up clad face as a young child buried in the body of an 80 year old (looks anyway, not the size. Explaining how a 5’10’’ man popped out of a woman would have been a challenge I would have liked to see) all the way to the white t-shirt wearing, motorcycle riding James Dean lookalike. He has a presence onscreen that grabs you, and despite playing nothing short of a science fiction character, we can relate to every emotion, and feel connected to him.

The problem, however, with The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is that, well, it’s not very good. It is a simple story of a man born old and growing young, and a relationship that happens somewhere in the middle. Simple enough. The issue lies in that while the script tells us exactly what happened, filling holes admirably and even delivering a certain level of believability, it never lets us in on why we should care. Events happen, simple because he wandered into them. The writer, Eric Roth, fails to deliver the almost mystical, endearing quality that he so ably found in Forrest Gump, and the result is a movie that serves as nothing more than eye candy. The majority of the comment on leaving the theater will be wondering how it was nominated for Best Picture rather than anything actually happening on screen.

As much as Pitt’s Button draws you in, the opposite can be said for Daisy, played by a terribly miscast Cate Blanchett. The relationship between Benjamin and Daisy early on is not enough to explain the great lengths he later goes to find her, and when he does, there is simply nothing likeable about her. The moments between Forrest and Jenny as children explained the deep emotional connection he would feel throughout his life, but nothing in the first act does that here. Steps in the relationship simply happen, with no gradual lead up or explanation as to the suddenness of the action. Button loves Daisy enough to travel the world for her. Why? Because the script says so.

Certainly the performance by Pitt is worth the price of admission. Tilda Swinton (taking her seemingly permanent place in the Clooney/Pitt filmography) is excellent in a limited role as worldly woman broadening Button’s horizons, and certainly the art direction and costume design is impeccable. However, with the exception of an old man becoming young, which is not as big a part in this movie as you might think, this has all been done before, especially in the vastly superior Forrest Gump, a movie that still remains a constant in any dinner table discussion of films. It is unlikely The Curious Case of Benjamin Button will be spoken of 15 minutes after leaving the theater.