Studio/Production Company: Warner Bros.
Director: Kirsten Sheridan
Written by: Nick Castle, James V. Hart, Paul Castro
Rating: PG for some thematic elements, mild violence, and language.
Release Date: November 21, 2007 (theater), March 11, 2008 (DVD)
Genre: Drama
Strong Points: Good acting from a talented cast.
Weak Points: Poor directing; badly written script; dialogue feels unnatural and stilted; characters have no depth; story is unbelievable and reaches the level of being ridiculous.
Technical Score: C+
Artistic Score: C-
Final Score (not an average): C
Moral Warnings: An implied one night stand; a solid amount of language, including numerous uses of ‘da--n’; brief violence towards the end involving a police raid.
Music is the focal point of August Rush. The title is the stage name of a musically genius orphan trying to get back to his long lost parents. August Rush reaches for great heights and doesn’t take long to over-extend itself. Children might be able to get some redeeming value out of the film, but anyone older is going to have put their power of suspending disbelief to the test in order find any real enjoyment in it.
The story begins with two musicians - a young cellist from Juilliard (Keri Russell), and a young rock star on the verge of making it big (John Rhys Meyers). With the help of a little Disney-esque magic, the two happen to meet on a night when they’ve both finished stellar musical performances. Sparks fly, lips are kissed, and it all proceeds to one of the sweetest, most romantic one-night stands of all time (how they wake up on a bench in the park is one that I still haven’t figured out). Naturally, they are both heart broken when they are forced to separate and go their own ways, resulting in a very melodramatic and surprisingly fast breakup.
The plot thickens when our young cellist finds out that she’s pregnant. Through a series of unfortunate events, she is led to believe that her little boy has died while in truth he has been sent to an orphanage. Enter little Ethan (Freddie Highmore).
By the time we reach him, Ethan is 11. Sweet, cute, and bullied by his fellow orphans, Ethan does not want to be adopted because he knows his parents are out there. How? He can hear them communicating with him through the music of life. Following his ears (or heart), Ethan flees the orphanage for New York in hopes of finding his parents.
Three stories branch out through the film - one for Ethan, one for his mother, and one for his father. It’s actually an interesting and promising premise as each one of them searches for who they love. Ethan is searching for his parents, the cellist for her boy, and the rock star for the cellist. Unfortunately the fantasy element of them being able to faintly sense one another through music taints this. The separate plots fail to move along in a seamless fashion, and there’s a heavy emphasis on Ethan where there should have been balance.
The script is just as poorly fashioned as the story. The scenes never achieve a solid pace. They are either bogged down or rushed, with the latter occurring more often. The characters are given no time whatsoever to develop, which makes it very hard to care what happens to them when things become complicated. The dialogue ranges from feeling unnatural to being just downright bad, and the entire film is steeped in melodrama.
Kirsten Sheridan’s directing doesn’t help. Her attempts to visually illustrate Ethan’s natural genius with music are stereotypical at best. Instead of pulling something new out of her director’s hat, she resides in the familiar and takes no risks whatsoever to bring any magic to a movie that seemed to want magic to be part of it.
The integration of music into the story is a natural key element of August Rush, which blends between the three main characters and their very different styles. This is most interesting in the instances when two of the styles are blended together. Each character plays far away from the other, but due to their ‘connection’ it is played as somewhat of a duet. It’s yet another element that makes you suspend disbelief, but it’s still a very artistic way of showing the connection between them.
There are some great performers in August Rush, but no great performances. Almost every actor on the main cast has proven his or her abilities in previous films, but they can only do so much when given a poor script. Freddie Highmore, who some may remember from his stellar performance alongside Johnny Depp in Finding Neverland, seems to be in a daze for most of the film as he is swept away by the music that hears from everyday things. Robin Williams plays an interesting character and just about the only one who seems to have any life to him at all. He does his best with what he’s given, which isn’t much, and is barely able to squeeze out something good.
There is a somewhat refreshing message to August Rush, which preaches the importance of family. The mother and father have troubled lives after their one romantic night, and happiness is only reached when all are back together again. This is probably the strongest quality of the film, but it doesn’t make the rest of it forgivable.
There was more bad language than I was expecting from August Rush, especially uses of the word ‘da--’. There are also several ‘h-ll’s and a few uses of God’s name in vain. There is an implied one night stand, though the scene fades before more than a few kisses are allowed in. Brief violence occurs towards the end of the movie. A man is hit over the head with a guitar by a young kid, knocking him out. A man grabs a kid roughly and yells at him. There is also a police raid and and a number of kids try to flee from the police.
August Rush tries to be a great family film, but tries too hard. Children may enjoy it, though adults will likely find it boring and the music functioning as a lullaby to put them to sleep.
--Zak Mellgren (zak@revolve21.com)
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