Hey everyone. Capone in Chicago here.
I'm not even sure where to begin with this one. I know a weirdly disproportionate number of people who not only have read the Sara Gruen novel upon which this films is based, but also loved it. In watching the film, I can almost see moments where having insight into various characters' thoughts and emotions would make the material quite good. But as adapted by the usually more reliable screenwriter Richard LaGravenese and director Francis Lawrence (I AM LEGEND, CONSTANTINE), this version of WATER FOR ELEPHANTS is a surface-level melodrama that never allowed me access into the hearts and minds of its subjects. Feelings don't seem to exist in this movie unless they're actually spoken aloud, and I finally realized that it's because Robert Pattinson simply isn't a strong enough actor to carry this material.
I don't mean to dump on the guy who has pretty much been the butt of all jokes since he starred in the first TWILIGHT movie, but Pattinson's entire method of expressing any level or type of emotion is putting on an angsty face. At least I think that's what it is. He may just be constipated. But that only explains Pattinson's part in this debacle. There are some good actors in this thing too, and they have fewer excuses beyond the writing. I tend to enjoy the works of Reese Witherspoon, but she's practically a background player in WATER FOR ELEPHANTS as Marlena, a circus performer married to the ringmaster and head of the operation, August (INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS' Christoph Waltz). Pattinson plays Jacob, a veterinary student at Cornell who is pulled out of his final exam with news that his father has died and left him nothing. Rather than return to school, Jacob chooses the life of a hobo and hops a train that just happens to belong to the circus.
Rather than kill him by tossing him off the train, August decides to take advantage of Jacob's animal doctoring skills and hires him to be the circus' vet. When Jacob puts down Marlena's star horse because the animal is in pain, he gives August the opportunity to bring in a new animal to the circus, an elephant that Marlena and Jacob must train so she can ride it. And its during these training sessions that the two fall in love...I think. At least, we're told they fall in love. There's a lot of telling and very little showing or believing in WATER FOR ELEPHANTS. On top of that, there is almost no chemistry between the leads, and it's almost a distraction how the film asks us to simply accept their feelings when they barely seem to like each other. Waltz's character does a much more convincing job at expressing his love for Marlena, even if he is a drunken, jealous man prone to violence.
What's even more frustrating is that, aside from their being an elephant in the midst of this love triangle, the story of WATER FOR ELEPHANTS is so damn conventional. It plays out with no surprises, no interesting twists, and practically no drama worth mentioning. It doesn't help that the film is bookended by a sweet but unnecessary modern-day story involving Hal Holbrook as "Old Jacob" trying to get a job in a circus by telling his tale to Paul Schneider. At the very least, we know Jacob doesn't die right off the bat, even though his life his threatened a half-dozen times by August. Give me an episode of HBO's long-defunct series "Carnivale" for great insight into the shady lives of circus folk, and give me just about anything else to stir my emotions. Hell, I'd take a Nicholas Sparks adaptation over having to watch this movie again.
The problem that keeps WATER FOR ELEPHANTS from working is that no one seems inspired enough to even try. I know that Witherspoon's last film HOW DO YOU KNOW didn't go over like gangbusters with audiences or critics, but at least she was giving that performance everything she had. Waltz comes the closest to breaking free of the shackles of a crummy script, but under the ham-handed direction of Lawrence, he transforms into a paint-by-numbers screen villain whose ranting and outbursts probably come from a place of real pain in his life, but you wouldn't know that from the screenplay. The film certainly was shot nicely, and everyone's costumes and well-groomed hair are on full display. But the elephant in the room is the bad writing and the off-key performances that result from it.
-- Capone
capone@aintitcool.com
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