A frequent pose struck by sunchild CJ Adams in THE ODD LIFE OF TIMOTHY GREEN
casting counts as character for most of the supporting roles: Dianne Wiest, M. Emmett Walsh, Lois Smith, Common, David Morse, Rosemarie DeWitt, Ron Livingston. Odeya Rush makes a nice impression as the town’s bad girl.
A slim, vaguely Bradburian premise arrives 25 years too late to be an episode of AMAZING STO- RIES and feels stretched even thin- ner at feature length. After the set-up, the film becomes a series of shallow scenes in which this self-possessed, mildly off-putting kid, half Haley Joel Osment and half Shirley Temple, charms the town grumps with his indefatiga- bility. Since it’s got “fable” writ- ten all over it, examining the plot too closely for logic wouldn’t be rewarding; even so, the results aren’t as ingratiating or magi- cal as they are inevitable, and at least one scene (a musical performance) doesn’t work at all. The “green” element is clear enough. The Greens’ failure to
produce is linked to the town’s pending economic failure, which is also embodied in everyone’s personal failings, and so they must all be tied together as Stanleyville “adopts” more envi- ronmentally cool pencils. The wise little preternatural entity teaches, as always, that every- thing’s connected, to cherish each moment, never give up, all you need is love, etc. The film’s low-key restraint keeps all this bearable.
Based on a story by Ahmet Zappa (Frank’s son), this film is scripted and directed by Peter Hedges, a novelist (WHAT’S EAT- ING GILBERT GRAPE) turned filmmaker (DAN IN REAL LIFE). We might seek connections in Hedges’ territory of bittersweet middle-class angst and fears of parenthood (he also scripted ABOUT A BOY), or Zappa’s other children’s projects about outsiders, but I’m tempted to make the case here for cinema- tographer-as-auteur, thanks to
the undeniable asset of double Oscar-winner John Toll. Toll’s rich hues and sense of smoothness, the lack of hurry or clutter, make every shot a plea- sure and easily link this film’s vi- sual sense to LEGENDS OF THE FALL, BRAVEHEART, THE THIN RED LINE, CAPTAIN CORELLI’S MANDOLIN, VANILLA SKY, THE LAST SAMURAI, ELIZABETH- TOWN, SERAPHIM FALLS, GONE BABY GONE, THE ADJUSTMENT BUREAU, and CLOUD ATLAS. These films invest the ordinary world with a sense of grandeur, and grand worlds with a sense of breathable reality. If you’d hold a film marathon for the DP, that’s a fascinating list. His follow-up project? IRON MAN 3.
His 1.85:1 image is immacu- lately served on disc with English, French and Spanish Dolby 5.1 soundtrack options (also an En- glish 2.0 DVS track) with subtitles in same. The extras are a music video and a short batch of deleted scenes.
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