FROM THE ARCHIVES 9: a review of "Seven Pounds"

There is a certain melancholy spirit lingering after the finale of "Lost," so I wanted to present to you another older review of an atmospheric and mournful film featuring an uncharacteristically grim performance by Will Smith.

Originally written April 26, 2009

"SEVEN POUNDS" Directed by Gabriele Muccino
*** (three stars)

When "Seven Pounds" was released this past winter and met an onslaught of negative reviews, a major criticism against the film was how manipulative it was which therefore took a sense of reality away from the story. While I do kind of understand what those critics were getting at, I do however feel that addressing a film as "manipulative" in a negative way is a strange comment to make as ALL MOVIES ARE MANIPULATIVE. Films tell stories and because of the nature of visual storytelling especially, films are designed to bring out certain responses within the viewers who watch them. Filmmakers want you to laugh, cry, be afraid, get your heart racing, take you to a meditative state and all manner of emotions. How successful they are at those feats is up to each and every film goer. That's just what films are and "Seven Pounds," brought to us by the second collaboration between Will Smith and Director Gabriele Muccino (who previously gave us the terrific "The Pursuit Of Happyness"), is no exception.

"Seven Pounds" is a decidedly somber, moody affair that I will describe as discreetly as I am able to not produce spoilers. Smith plays Ben Thomas, a deeply tormented man who is feverishly trying to positively alter the lives of seven complete strangers, including Woody Harrelson as a blind man and Rosario Dawson, an artisan forced to cease producing her work due to a heart condition. With that description, I am certain that you astute movie watchers out there can see where at least some of the roads the film is going to travel and again, I can understand the criticism. There is a convoluted nature to the story which does feel a tad false here and there. I know I was annoyed at the somewhat cryptic discussions between characters that felt forced and prefabricated such as:

CHARACTER #1: Remember the thing I gave you?
CHARACTER #2: I remember. Do you remember what I gave you?
CHARACTER #1: Yeah (dramatic pause) I remember.

And then it's on to the next scene.

For a few moments, I felt as if the filmmakers were trying to emulate something akin to M. Night Shymalayan's work and it was frustrating me. In fact, even some of the film's evocative music score, which features one badly thumped piano note--signifying Dawson's broken heart perhaps--seemed silly. But then, somehow it began to weave a spell over me and I was ultimately taken in.

"Seven Pounds" may be one of those films where the honesty comes from emotional truths regardless of how preposterous the proceedings may be. A filmmaker who performs that feat for me consistently is Writer/Director Wes Anderson whose "Rushmore," "The Royal Tenenbaums" and "The Darjeeling Limited" often feel like stories from some other universe but they are always emotionally truthful to me as their melancholy spirits take hold and I can see how his fractured tales of family and loss resonate fully. Muccino orchestrates the film with a steady, empathetic hand never allowing the film to slide into grand melodrama even as it threatens to in a number of sequences. And by the film's end it really did build to a certain power of catharsis. The predominant theme of death certainly made it a companion piece to last year's much more successful winter films "The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button" and the highly artful "Synecdoche, New York" as it pursued the push-pull tension of lives failing and lives rising.

My greatest credit towards this film is the performance of Will Smith, an actor who continues to surprise and amaze. I really think of him as being in the same league as someone like Tom Cruise, strong actors who are actually quite underrated as the enormity of their celebrity may cloud people's views of their actual talent. While Smith utilizes his unbreakable determination again, it is through a character where Smith is forced to travel down some extremely dark emotional tunnels--previously unseen by him on screen.

Appearing as if he were the adult version of his character from "Six Degrees Of Separation," he is by turns charming (a Smith trademark), eerie and even at points, sinister. Mostly, Smith portrays the weight of a man crushed by a past tragedy and he lives in a crippled, broken state of sadness. His redemptive path by improving those aforementioned lives of the seven strangers is a suicidal one and the duality of seeing him wanting to shed light while he himself lives in an emotional black hole makes for a honest, riveting performance. When he says, "I think about dying every day," you believe it, the effect is simultaneously chilling and sorrowful and that is a testament to the power of Smith's stunning performance.

By the moment the end credits began to scroll, I realized how much "Seven Pounds" actually moved me. I know some elements may provide unintentional laughs or moments of disbelief with some viewers (including a much maligned jellyfish--I won't get into it here) but somehow, it felt just right. The poetry of it all worked for me.

As the flesh fails, the soul prevails and in the film's final moments, I think Muccino and Smith delivered that sentiment in an unusual, sometimes needlessly complicated yet decidedly honest fashion where the manipulation on display never felt like a cheat. I am happy to recommend this film to all of you.