Garden State
... movie reviews
sun 2004-aug-22 02:34:42 pdt
... permalink
Tonight we went to see Garden
State -- it was great! I'm not really sure where to begin in
explaining what I liked about it. I guess to a great extent it's lots
of little details about it that I enjoyed. But no, I think that makes
it sound more frivolous or something than it is. The overall, I
dunno, gestalt of the film just worked really well.
One of the details I liked was, near the beginning of the movie, all
the different people that he comes across who he knew back in high
school and who never left town, and their reactions to seeing him
again, and what they've heard about him or what they remember about
him, or whatever... All those little interactions were great.
Another thing was all the various seemingly random quirks that the
different characters had, which made them seem very real, not just
generic stock mid-twenties suburban characters, or whatever. Natalie
Portman's character is especially fabulous, and her acting is great.
So yeah, overall, it's not really a plot movie, it's more a
character-development movie, with characters that are compelling
enough to make it work. Good writing, good acting, and even some nice
cinematography to boot. There should be more films like this.
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