Variety on Benjamin Button

Both Anne Thompson and Todd McCarthy have given their responses to The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and the reception for this film is beginning to feel as curious as the film itself. McCarthy and Thompson both discuss what they felt was a “cold” aspect to the film, a label that seems to come up often from people who’ve seen it; you’ll get none of that from me. The coldness felt to me a necessary part of the experience – the Fincher part. You’d scarcely recognize this director’s style otherwise. But beyond that, the way folk art is almost creepy in its loneliness, this film displays. At any rate, here is McCarthy:

Still, for what is designed as a rich tapestry, the picture maintains a slightly remote feel. No matter the power of the image of an old but young-looking Benjamin, slumped over a piano and depressed about his fading memory and life; it is possible that the picture might have been warmer and more emotionally accessible had it been shot on film. It has been argued that digital is a cold medium and celluloid a hot one and a case, however speculative, could be made that a story such as “Benjamin Button,” with its desired cumulative emotional impact, should be shot and screened on film to be fully realized. These are intangibles, but nor are they imaginary factors; what technology gives, it can also take away.

And Thompson:

Thus, while I admire the film’s amazing accomplishment–it’s hard to imagine that anyone but the digitally sophisticated Fincher, who has become adept at “painting” his digital canvases, could have pulled this off–the movie is not entirely satisfying. But given what it is, it’s hard to imagine it being done done any better. The actors are superb, especially Pitt and Cate Blanchett, who should earn Oscar noms. What’s missing has partly to do with the limitations of the technology.