Charlie St. Cloud (1:39, PG-13) — fantasy: supernatural; 3rd string; original
It's entirely possible that Zac Efron can really act. We may never know. He always plays the same character: a good-looking, sensitive, semi-credibly athletic, Boy Scouty high-school kid with Clairol-model floppy hair. He could do it in his sleep. He could do it on speed. He could do it on Ritalin. He may be able to do it after he's dead, and they just prop him up and let his corpse go thru the motions.
Speaking of which, here's what we know from the trailers. Charlie St. Cloud's kid brother Sam was killed in an accident, but Charlie had promised to play catch with him at dusk every day, and the kid's ghost keeps showing up expecting older bro to keep his word. Honorable Charlie does exactly that, as a result of which he drifts away from real life, which now notably includes a romantic interest, former classmate Tess Carroll (Amanda Crew), who wants to sail her sloop around the world and wouldn't mind Charlie's company on the trip. But Charlie can't let go.
Guess how this turns out. Final answer? Exactly right! You win!
There are a few additional wrinkles that you can pick up by actually sitting thru the whole movie. One is that this game of catch has been going on for an hour a day for over 1800 days now, and even after all that time neither kid can throw a baseball worth a damn. Another tidbit is that Charlie is able to talk to other dead people besides Sam. Also, he's artistic. And really, really sensitive. (Did I mention that already?)
So that leaves us with the only real dilemma posed by this low-wattage would-be tear- jerker: mawkish or maudlin, mawkish or maudlin?
Sam is played by the young actor Charlie Tahan, and even while watching the movie my mind kept drifting off to thots of what the on-set reaction would be when Director Burr Steers said something like "Charlie, you stand over here."; who, really, did he mean, the actor or the character? If the movie doesn't engage you enuf in the plot to keep these kinds of distractions from creeping in, it's not a good sign.
Kim Basinger and Ray Liotta are also in the pic, in separate scenes, for just a tad longer than it took you to read their names off the poster.
There's nothing egregiously offensive about this movie, it's just not worth seeing.
It's entirely possible that Zac Efron can really act. We may never know. He always plays the same character: a good-looking, sensitive, semi-credibly athletic, Boy Scouty high-school kid with Clairol-model floppy hair. He could do it in his sleep. He could do it on speed. He could do it on Ritalin. He may be able to do it after he's dead, and they just prop him up and let his corpse go thru the motions.
Speaking of which, here's what we know from the trailers. Charlie St. Cloud's kid brother Sam was killed in an accident, but Charlie had promised to play catch with him at dusk every day, and the kid's ghost keeps showing up expecting older bro to keep his word. Honorable Charlie does exactly that, as a result of which he drifts away from real life, which now notably includes a romantic interest, former classmate Tess Carroll (Amanda Crew), who wants to sail her sloop around the world and wouldn't mind Charlie's company on the trip. But Charlie can't let go.
Guess how this turns out. Final answer? Exactly right! You win!
There are a few additional wrinkles that you can pick up by actually sitting thru the whole movie. One is that this game of catch has been going on for an hour a day for over 1800 days now, and even after all that time neither kid can throw a baseball worth a damn. Another tidbit is that Charlie is able to talk to other dead people besides Sam. Also, he's artistic. And really, really sensitive. (Did I mention that already?)
So that leaves us with the only real dilemma posed by this low-wattage would-be tear- jerker: mawkish or maudlin, mawkish or maudlin?
Sam is played by the young actor Charlie Tahan, and even while watching the movie my mind kept drifting off to thots of what the on-set reaction would be when Director Burr Steers said something like "Charlie, you stand over here."; who, really, did he mean, the actor or the character? If the movie doesn't engage you enuf in the plot to keep these kinds of distractions from creeping in, it's not a good sign.
Kim Basinger and Ray Liotta are also in the pic, in separate scenes, for just a tad longer than it took you to read their names off the poster.
There's nothing egregiously offensive about this movie, it's just not worth seeing.