johnny-143

And then fast forward to the scenes with the evil cats, they are the

most interesting. The humans are sadly wasted, Jeff Goldblum does a riff

on his fun scientist from The Fly, but no one really gets to do much of

anything. A few dogs crack wise, but not very wise or very well, so

you're left watching the animation and marvelling at how they got the

mouths to move. Not worth it.

Whatever the title is, this is a very fine movie. I didn't mind the 'camera shakes' and wiggles, I just took it for granted that it was a low budget film that they were trying to spice up a bit. The acting is really good, and the story is wonderful. I'd see it again in a heartbeat, it's really quite good. The lead actor reminded me of Liam Neeson in "Schindlers List", he's tall and kind of funny looking but in a handsome way, and the woman playing his wife is good too. They all are! I loved it.

I'm not kidding, everyone is doing very wonderful realistic acting,

beautifully serving the script, and along comes Ferris Beuller doing his

quasi Jackie Gleason "I'll getta laugh on this line!" schtick.

Thankfully, his role is brief, and soon we get back to the real actors.

Linney and Ruffalo shine and Culkin is wonderful and touching. The

writing is superb, and apparently the writer/director also played the

priest- and steals the scene he's in! This is a wonderful throwback to

the character driven dramas of the early 70's, it's not filmed in a

particularly interesting way, but the script and the actors- well, most

of them- elevate it to heights that few movies achieved last year. Well

worth seeing.