Water for Elephants
Review
by Anthony Morris
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Water for Elephants
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For all the stories about kids who want to run away and join the
circus, it’s not that often we get a movie where it actually happens.
So
despite the soft-focus chocolate box camerawork and firm promise that
once again the past is the most romantic place to hang lout in, it
turns out that this otherwise fairly standard romantic drama is
actually pretty interesting if you have the slightest interest in the
golden age of circuses...
Otherwise know as - the Great Depression!
Back
when times were hard, Polish veterinary student Jacob (Robert
Pattinson) suffers a double blow when not only are both of his parents
killed in a car crash but it turns out they didn’t have a cent to their
name.
Hitting the road like so many other men did, he ends up
hitching a ride on a circus train – not the safest way to travel, as
carney folk didn’t worry much about throwing people off onto the rocks.
Turns out that a vet has his uses around big animals, and the
circus’s slightly sinister owner and ringmaster August (Christoph
Waltz) gives him a job on the basis of the work he does with the horse
of the circus’ star attraction (and August’s wife) Marlena (Reese
Witherspoon).
Of course, all that working together soon leads
to deeper feelings, which aren’t such a good idea with august throwing
people off the train every chance he gets.
The circus setting
is vividly realised, giving the story a real sense of place even as the
actual romance comes off as somewhat colourless. It’s as if
they wanted to make a circus movie and knew the only way they could
sell it was as a romance; while it might be true, it doesn’t mean the
romance itself couldn’t have been beefed up a little. 3 out
of 5
Water for Elephants
Australian release: 12th May,
2011
Official
Site: Water for Elephants
Cast: Reese Witherspoon, Robert Pattinson, Christoph Waltz
Director: Francis Lawrence
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