 |
|
|
|
Everything is Illuminated (2005)
 email this review to a friend
Movie Review by Jarrod 
September 23rd, 2005
|  |
Though a relatively low-profile actor (appearing most recently in The Manchurian Candidate remake), Liev Schreiber proves himself to be a rather talented director with 'Everything Is Illuminated', an adaptation of Jonathan Safran Foer's acclaimed novel of the same name.
Elijah Wood plays a character named Jonathan, who obsessively collects just about everything you can imagine. He is an American Jew interested in finding out about his past, particularly in uncovering the truth about the woman who saved his grandfather from the Nazis as they destroyed a village in the Ukraine. He meets up with two eccentric Ukranians, a young man named Alex (Eugene Hutz) and his cranky grandfather (Boris Leskin), who act as his guides. Alex does most of the work, however, such as translating (he demonstrates his terrible command of the English language) and pestering Jonathan for information on the pop stars he idolizes, such as Michael Jackson.
The film starts off as a strangely structured comic odyssey, with several humorous moments, most of which involve the craziness of Hutz and Leskin (not to mention the dog that accompanies them), but also the awkwardness of Jonathan and his complete unfamiliarity with Ukranian culture, which never really gets explained to him that well. However, it becomes much more serious towards the end, at times bordering on Holocaust drama, and, in this regard, it achieves the most success.
Elijah Wood is perhaps trying to shed the image of Frodo by taking a rather wide variety of roles. First, in Green Street Hooligans, where he played a quiet Harvard student who gets pulled into a world of recreational violence, and now in this movie, where he never really seems to exhibit much in the way of personality. It is an effective performance, once you realize that Jonathan is intended to be a rather dull and reclusive individual. Hutz and Leskin are simply delightful, bringing joy to the film in its early stages, and acting as a reminder of that joy as it disappears in the final parts.
'Everything Is Illuminated' is skillfully written and directed, with Schreiber allowing for a very smooth and practical shift in tone, from whimsy and satire to sorrow and solemnity. At its core, this is a powerful and insightful film, with an ample degree of quirkiness and charm. Given the rather meandering nature of the source material, one can assume that there are plotlines that are never explored, characters that are never introduced, and issues that are never confronted. However, while some of these things may have made the film better, some of them might have also undermined it, making it longer or less interesting. Whatever the case, this is an accomplished and enjoyable film.
email this review to a friend
Comment on this Review:
Sorry, you must be a member to add comments to reviews.
Join or Login. |
 Subscribe to MatchFlick Movie Reviews through RSS
|
