Max Tivoli beats Benjamin Button hands down (The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button (DVD))

Member Name: pagso

Product:	The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button (DVD)
Date:	07/09/09 (27 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Clever make up

Disadvantages: Boring, dull interpretation of a fascinating idea

A few years ago I read a book called The Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer which tells the story of a man born aged 70 years old who ages backwards and of the relationship he has with the woman he loves - as an old man with a young girl, then at the same age and finally as a child with an old lady. This is a fantastic book which was thought provoking and I thought at the time highly original so recommended to family & friends.

Consequently I was very surprised to hear about this film The Curious Case of Benjamin Button which tells basically the same story and then even more surprised to hear it is based on a short story by F Scott Fitzgerald. I now learn that Greer's book was inspired by Fitzgerald's short story. I haven't read the latter so can't comment on it but if anyone enjoyed the story of Benjamin Button I would highly recommend The Confessions of Max Tivoli which is a beautifully written story.

Having enjoyed Greer's book so much I was really looking forward to watching Benjamin Button - what a disappointment!! The film starts with a dying Cate Blanchett getting her daughter to read out Benjamin's story which opens with his birth aged 80 - the size of a newborn but with the face and body of an old man. His mother dies in childbirth and his distraught and shocked father leaves the "newborn" on the steps of an old people's home in New Orleans. He is taken in and raised by the loving matron of the home.

The film traces his life and adventures he has along the way and the relationship he has with Cate Blanchett's character - when she is a young child and he has the body of an elderly man, then as lovers and when she cares for him as a dying baby. But the film is so dull, I found it quite hard to hear the dialogue and basically it was boring. The CGI and make up effects ageing Brad Pitt are quite impressive although at the end they do use a child actor - I had kept watching to see how they were going to make him look that young!

I can't comment on the extras as by the end of the film I had had enough.

Summary: Read The Confessions of Max TIvoli - its an excellent version of the same story