The Disturbingly Lovely Bones

This week's movie was "The Lovely Bones" with Mark Wahlberg, Rachel Weisz, Susan Sarandon and the uber scary Stanley Tucci. I think that Nat had a tougher time with this one than I did. It's the story about a murdered teen in the mid seventies and how she watches over her family as they try to grieve their loss as well as find her killer. She is caught in an area of "the in between" and has her own struggles with her loss of family, friends and love and life but is still acutely aware of her anger and need for revenge.
Now, I understand that my Mr. Julia Child, the incredibly versatile Stanley Tucci is nominated for Best Supporting Actor for this years Oscars and I'll speak about him in a minute, but I need to mention the incredible talent of this young woman...Ms. Saoirse Ronan who plays the lovely but unfortunate character of the murdered Suzie Salmon. I last saw Saoirse (I don't know how to pronounce it, so it's a good thing that this isn't a video blog) was in Atonement. Did you see that one...she was the little sister, who basically causes all the trouble. She was great in Atonement. She was fantastic in The Lovely Bones. She was fresh and light and carefree all the attributes that you would think about with regards to a young girl in the 70's. She is a good student, has friends, is a loving sister and has a new crush at school. The manner in which Peter Jackson shows the approach of our sinister Mr. Tucci towards our young beauty Saoirse, is very frightening. Absolutely every parent's nightmare and nearly impossible to move on from.
This movie posed all those horrific questions...what happens if you lose a child? How does a parent cope? How do you deal with your other children? How do you connect with your spouse?
It's a sad day in my mind when a parent outlives their child. No matter how old your child is - whether they are 5, 25 or even 50 years old- it's absolutely wrong in my book. In this movie you have two parents both grieving so intensely and trying to deal with these disgusting circumstances but in such different ways. It was tough to watch, as your mind always flickers to your own children and what you think you would be doing in this situation.
It was nice for me to see Mark Wahlberg in parental role. He's married with several children now, so this must have been quite a challenge for him. He was very sweet, tender and controlled in this movie. Rachel Weisz was also decent, but I didn't connect with her as much as I thought that I would. Her mother was played by Susan Sarandon, whom is always a delight to see on screen. She was hip and funny and brought some interesting family dynamics into play.
Ok, so now of course is the time where I have to discuss the ultra scary and very unstable Mr. Tucci's Mr. Harvey. This character scared the living bejesus out of me. He was careful and matriculate. He carefully planned and orchestrated his actions and was very deliberate. That's the part that freaked me out...everything was done for a reason. It was hard watching him keeping an eye out on the neighbourhood. It all seemed so wrong. He just seemed wrong...out of place. Clearly this was a family filled area, with children's bikes and scooters and lots of laughter and toy cars strewn on the lawn. Seeing this man standing in his house, overlooking all this was very unnerving. I appreciated the nomination for him...I don't believe that he will win this year, but he certainly raised the bar when I think of movie murderers. Yeesh! I still get goosebumps.