Having become renowned in recent years for big-budget Hollywood epics like Lord of the Rings and King Kong, Peter Jackson’s most recent offering marks a surprise about turn into more human emotion-driven storytelling territory. Based on the novel by Alice Sebold, The Lovely Bones tells the story of 14 year-old Susie Salmon (Saoirse Ronan), who is brutally murdered by her neighbour Mr Harvey (Stanley Tucci), ending up in the ‘In-Between’, a kind of Heaven, where she struggles to reconcile her desire for revenge against seeing her family move on.
If the above paragraph sounds like I’ve given away the story – it was all in the trailer, so don’t worry about it. Although the murder is incident that sets in motion the events of the story, the focus is instead placed on the consequences of this action, thus ensuring that the film isn’t dominated by the memory of such a horrible crime. This is a human story, first and foremost: and it is human interactions that form the fulcrum of the story.
Fresh from her role in Atonement, Ronan is simply brilliant as Susie, displaying a maturity far beyond her years with a performance that has to bode well for her future acting career. Mark Wahlberg (who was a late replacement for Ryan Gosling in the role of Susie’s father, Jack) unexpectedly soars in a role that goes against type, displaying a tenderness and vulnerability you wouldn’t have thought him capable of; Susan Sarandon also makes a star turn as the wacky grandmother, not only providing comic relief but also proving an inspiration in a film that is a tribute to the human spirit and endurance.
But by far the best thing about the film is Stanley Tucci. In a role that is a lifetime from his good-natured performances in the likes of The Devil Wears Prada and Julie & Julia, Tucci’s Mr Harvey is eerily convincing as the seemingly benign neighbour hiding a dark secret; well deserving of his Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actor.
The Lovely Bones has garnered criticism in the US for its ambiguous portrayal of the afterlife, but you shouldn’t let this put you off (!) what is actually a very, very good film. Now, The Hobbit beckons…
