About the film:
Spoilers - The film tells a non-linear story about different generations of families that lived in the same area/house. It starts at the land before time where dinosaurs ruled the earth, and moves foward to the time of the Native Americans. Eventually, stu white people come along. Benjamin Franklin's illegitimate son William lives on the land. Flatch forward to several other families who live in the home that is built on the land, including a pilot during WWI who dies of the 1918 influenza pandemic, the guy who invented the La-z-boy furniture, a couple of other stuffy families and eventually the main focus - Paul Bettany and Kelly Reilly. They are WWII boomers who purchase the home right after the war ends. Eventually they raise a family. Their son, Tom Hanks, grows up in the house, meets Robin Wright, and they move into the house along with their parents.
The film flows through time, cutting back and forth through the various time periods, but eventually the story becomes linear toward the end.
I don't recall ever seeing anything like this film. The camera is locked down in one angle for the entire film (except the very end). It never moves. You see the same vantage point, but the things in the shot change. It was done well.
Where the film suffers is the pacing. The jumping around at times gets annoying and I wanted to see what happened after a particular event but the director reminds us time flows on and we're unable to control it.
There are several themes present in this film, the biggest one is time moves forward. A couple of the characters mention this. We can't stop time, and we can't go backwards.
The film does get you in the feels a couple of times, especially the last third when everyone is aging and dying off. It's a fact of life. We're all going to die. Hell, someone I worked with died last week, and I just found out about it today.
I guess that's why it got me in the feels. I hate getting older. I don't think anyone likes it. I hate seeing my family age. I hate seeing people around me dying. I hate seeing celebrities I grew up with passing on. But that's what happens. Some things we can't control. Other things we can. The movie is telling us to embrace the limited time we have on this planet, and not get hung up on whether or not we were rich or successful, but rather, we enjoyed the ride.
As cliche as it sounds, that's literally it.
I'm on the fence as to whether this would work on a small screen. I don't think it would work as well. It may not even be one I would watch again and again. Years from now, maybe.
To me, this isn't Zemeckis' best film, but it's good to see him doing live action again. Cast Away was better than this. Flight was better than this. Is it bad? No, but it's definitely different.
The special effects are pretty good. I even felt bad for the native American guy. Hea.
Here gets 3.4 stars out of 5. It's not perfect by any means. It drags a little, and you can easily get lost if you go to the bathroom during this film. You'll miss important parts to the eventual narrative. Does it make you cry? It did for me, so take of that what you will. Then again, I cry at a lot of movies. That's just who I am. It is what it is. It accomplished the goal of making me teary eyed. Melanies are stone cold faced and don't show emotion, but that's beside the point. If you're waiting for this to come out on rental, see it on the big screen first. It's worth it. Plus, it'll probably be at the cheaper musty smelling theater now. God that place needs to be remodeled. Or, torn down.
Millions of years ago, dinosaurs were pooping right on this spot. Native Americans and William Franklin created monuments on this plot of land. - Later in the film, one of those monuments is dug up.