Wow. I had read the book so I knew the story in advance, but even so this movie was really powerful. It's got great visuals and the direction is very good (everyone loves Ang Lee but I've always found him kind of hit-or-miss; this is a definite hit though). The acting is good to great, with a couple of rough patches. The CGI animals are amazing. The movie follows the book plot almost exactly, which surprised me a bit. I am going to go so far as to say I think this works better as a movie than a book. The central theme of it, which I won't get into because of spoilers, comes across a lot better when you get everything in a more compact way. They absolutely nailed a brilliant and super-understated, perfect ending. I was wowed. My wife, who had not read the book, also loved it, to the point that she wouldn't even get up out of her seat for a few minutes after it was over. Big thumbs-up.
The book underwhelmed me a tad. I think I was oversold on it. Is this one of those movies that really MUST be seen bigscreen? We typically wait for video, but this seems like the visuals might suffer more than some.
I'd say yes. The visuals are amazing. Also, the 3D is pretty great. I don't normally like 3D but someone told me I had to see this in 3D and I'm glad I did. But even in 2D, this is as big a see-it-in-the-theater movie as they get.
Saw it last night in 3D - beautiful, beautiful film. Will wait to add spoilers, but it is an interesting film about faith. Interesting watching it with my wife (who is very religious)
It was gorgeous. Heavy-handed at times, but overall pretty good. My 12 year old brothers really enjoyed it, and that shocked me to no end; I would've thought they'd prefer to see Ralph but they loved this movie.
The 3d for this was really great. I thought the beginning was really slow. The whole setting of the stage could use a lot of trimming without sacrificing the central theme of the story. Do I really need to see mamaji swimming around? Or the bits with the girl. I think there was an early section in the book where Pi's 3 religious mentors argued with one another that they cut, even as I thought that was one of the key scenes in the early sections. Once the story gets to the ocean, it's all great though. I was afraid of how they'd bring the island to visual life, but they somehow managed it, even if it was a tad too big and fantastical. I agree the story works a lot better in the visual form. Even knowing the story prior, there were plenty of times where the visuals, and the pacing of the movie brought the tension and emotion front and center. Overall, I enjoyed it, and recommend it to anyone to watch it in 3D.
I saw it today. This is the first time in memory I've stayed to watch the credits just so I could pull myself together a little before emerging into the lobby. (I'm a sucker for animal stories.)
SPOILERING THIS ALL UP As an aside, the only times I have gone "transcendental" in meditation were when I am able to suspend my rationality, and submerge my ego. One example was on meditating on the concept of transubstantiation, another was deciding to believe in God for that time.
SPOILERS WITH NO TAGS FLEE IN TERROR IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE MOVIE YET. I am a diehard athiest. For me, the movie made two great points: 1) as someone said above, the point that people choose to believe in religion, even though they know in their hearts that it isn't true, because it's comforting. But even more than that, 2) That it doesn't matter whether the story is true; all that matters is whether it helps you understand something about life. When adult-Pi asks the author "Which story do you prefer?", we all know that the cannibalism one is the true one. When the author says "The one with the tiger," and Pi says "So it is with God," that's the whole movie, right there, brilliantly delivered. I also really liked their decision to keep one long shot on teenage-Pi during the cannibalism story. I was sure that was going to be done in flashback, especially after I saw they had cast a name actor as the cook. The choice to just focus on Pi's mostly emotionless face as he tells the story was genius. So powerful.
never read the book, but I've seen the movie some years ago and loved it. have to go hunt it in the pile of my dvds to re-watch \O/
Have to agree with Rywill. I liked the idea of the book but found the execution a little lacking. The film is just plain better than the book. I think it better sets up his life before the voyage and makes you care more about his family than you do in the book, which in turn makes everything that follows more powerful. It also better handles the framing of the story. The journey at sea is accompanied by beautiful visuals. The finale is, as said, beautifully understated and masterfully handled using that straight on shot of his face. The acting is superb throughout. A hearty thumbs up for this and I'll definitely be getting the blu-ray.
