Jake Gyllenhaal Movie:

Editorial Review:
Screenwriter David Benioff (The 25th Hour) didn't have to do much to relocate Brothers from Denmark to America. The story remains the same: Captain Sam Cahill (Tobey Maguire) loves his family, but he's equally devoted to his career. Just as his ne'er-do-well brother, Tommy (Jake Gyllenhaal), exits prison, where he did time for robbery, the Marines deploy Sam to Afghanistan. Tommy starts looking in on his wary sister-in-law, Grace (Natalie Portman), but then Sam's helicopter crashes in the mountains, and the military informs Grace that her husband has died. Unbeknownst to the Cahill clan, the Taliban has taken Sam hostage and tortures him to elicit information. Sam resists, but his colleague caves, leading to an unthinkable act. Back in New Mexico, Grace and Tommy grow closer, stopping just short of a full-blown affair (in Susanne Bier's original, they take the plunge). Even Tommy's disapproving Vietnam vet father, Hank (Sam Shepard), sees his son in a new light after Tommy renovates Grace's kitchen. But when Sam is rescued by his company, he returns a broken man and is convinced that his wife has fallen in love with his brother. Even his daughters are afraid of him (Bailee Madison impresses as the eldest). As in Bier's film, Jim Sheridan (In America) elevates redemption and forgiveness over tragedy and loss, and his well-meaning remake gets off to a solid start, but it loses steam by the end. Brothers offers a compelling scenario, but the telling is too overstated to capture the full heartbreak of the situation. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

Brothers [Theatrical Release] Reviews:
The simultaneous overlapping of news diminished the excitement of real-life discovery of the other side of any conflict.
2009-12-11 - The plan of linearly telling a multifaceted, long story diminished the joy of engaging the viewer. The movie attempted to cover too many places and scenarios in a short space, but to end up circumstantial on most themes. By the time the viewer gets a feel of the family life prior to the marine's leave to Afghanistan, the viewer is exposed to the brief and intense scenario of getting captured by the enemy. The scenario shifts back to the family adjustment after the news of missing the husband, father, and son marine.

Here the movies touches on multiple scenarios on relation to the missing father of two daughters, the feeling of his widow, the struggle of the father of the missing marine, and the reaction of the community to such loss. In this complicated third scenario, the brother of the marine stands up to support the family of his lost brother. The troubled brother appeared saner than his prospering marine's brother.

Then the movie shifts gears to explain the whereabouts of the war prisoner, with no clear idea why he was compelled to kill his mate other than making a video tape. The return home that surprised the unexacting family was cold and lacked any appropriate preparation. By then, the viewer has already been shuffled back and forth between three disconnected family situations, three disconnected marine personalities, and very sketchy capturing drama.

The viewer is thus witnessing the two sides of totally disconnected theaters of events in total defiance of real life experience. Such improper and unreal feeding of news could only happen long after discovery completes. With the simultaneous reporting of events, the viewer already expects the reaction of the characters since their prior inducing experiences were told in advance.

The display of the posttraumatic struggle was very brief and tense and should have been more elaborate to allow for reasonable outcome. It was not clear whether the returned marine injured by his own incarceration or his suspicion of his wife's betrayal or otherwise.

The choice of the actors and their roles was spotless. Yet, the attempt to squeeze very long story, in monotonous chronic sequence, made the scenario predicable and diminished the excitement of thought exercising. The producer was able, but did not attempt, to depict the scenarios of capture, torture, and release of the marine as flash back nightmares, while expanding of the posttraumatic struggle of the returned marine. Instead, the producer was explaining every event, on both sides of the world, between home and the war zone, with only one goal in mind, of the producer of course, of reciting a sequence of affairs.



A good, but not great, war-themed film.
2009-12-07 - The trailer for 'Brothers' presents an interesting premise : the brother of a fallen Marine takes up with the widowed wife and children. When the Marine turns out to be alive, he returns to a home that doesn't perceive as home anymore, either on the surface nor beneath it.

Natalie Portman and Jake Gyllenhall each turned in good performances in leading roles, as did Sam Shepherd in his supporting role, but the performance that most impressed me was Tobey Maguire's. I've never viewed Maguire as an actor with a lot of range or depth. In fact, it took me a while into this movie to get "Spider-Man" out of my head. But his turn as the returning war veteran was the standout of this film. Not Oscar-caliber, but definitely noteworthy, and he showed much more depth than I expected from him in his role.

The pacing of the movie is slow, but not terribly slow. The story is very well-written, and there is some excellent metaphorical usage throughout, but the execution of it all simply falls flat. This movie could have easily slipped into "message film" mode, but it avoided that trap. We are reminded, however, that the price of war isn't measured in dollars. It's worth noting that I found the ending to be appropriate and satisfying in its subtlety.

The mark of a good and/or memorable movie is one that you're able to discuss long after you've left the theater. My friend and I had stopped talking about it less than five minutes after we walked out. This is not a bad movie, but it's just not a movie that stays with you. An excellent cast, and certainly not a bad movie, but not a must-see film.