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Movie Preview: Peter Jackson's The Lovely Bones

BuzzSugar — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 09:40:49 -0700

If you've read the book The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold, you'll know that it's a heartwrenching, mysterious tale about family, death - and whatever comes after death. Peter Jackson's film adaptation has been a point of discussion ever since it was announced over two years ago, from the casting choices to the question of how to adapt a story like this, which regularly blurs the line between reality and the supernatural. Jackson's 1994 movie Heavenly Creatures does this very thing as well, which made him a good choice for this particular challenge.

The new trailer for the film, which opens Dec. 11, starts out tender and soft before building to a tense and chilling crescendo. Atonement's Saoirse Ronan plays Susie Salmon, a young teen who narrates the story after she's been murdered. She observes her family as they try to piece together what happened to her, and it's all a big tangle of scariness, sadness, and aching sweetness. To watch the trailer, click here.

Wahlberg Replaces Gosling in The Lovely Bones

BuzzSugar — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 04:30:00 -0700

This is pretty shocking: Ryan Gosling has suddenly dropped out of Peter Jackson's film adaptation of The Lovely Bones, in which he was supposed to play Susie's father. Mark Wahlberg stepped in to fill the role on Sunday after reading the script, and the film is still scheduled to start shooting today in Pennsylvania.

I was pretty excited when I heard Gosling had been cast in the film, and he certainly seemed committed to the role, recently gaining weight and growing a beard. Variety said only that "creative differences" caused Gosling to leave on Friday.

I'm a fan of Wahlberg - I thought his performance in The Departed last year totally made the movie, and I've been excited for his upcoming starring roles in The Happening and The Fighter. But I certainly wasn't expecting this. Can you see Wahlberg in this role? And does Gosling's exit make you worried about The Lovely Bones?

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More Lovely Bones Casting: Imperioli and Sarandon

BuzzSugar — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 11:00:38 -0700

I was trying to take a break from writing about Peter Jackson's screen adaptation of The Lovely Bones, but the cast just keeps expanding. In fact, I think we can officially start calling it "star-studded" now.

The latest news is that Michael Imperioli of "The Sopranos" has signed on to the movie. According to the Hollywood Reporter, Imperioli - who got five Emmy nominations, including one this year, during his time on "The Sopranos" - will play Detective Len Fenerman.

Susan Sarandon also has joined the cast since last I wrote, playing the character of the grandmother who moves in with the family after Susie's death. I know casting isn't all about looks, but I really can picture Rachel Weisz as her daughter.

While the pre-review of the screenplay still makes me wary, I have to say I like the way the cast is coming together. What do you think?

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Stanley Tucci Cast in The Lovely Bones

BuzzSugar — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 11:26:26 -0700

Yes, I know I've been paying a tremendous amount of attention to any and all news regarding Peter Jackson's adaptation of The Lovely Bones, but as far as book-to-movie projects go, this one is pretty important to me. So, here's the latest in the long string of casting news: Stanley Tucci is in negotiations to play killer George Harvey in the movie, says Hollywood Reporter.

When I was reading the book, I envisioned someone a little more decrepit, someone much closer to Jackie Earle Haley (who played creepy pedophile Ronnie McGorvey in Little Children). However, Tucci often has a commanding and intimidating presence onscreen (he played Nigel in The Devil Wears Prada, among others), and I can easily see him being super scary. What do you think about this latest bit of Lovely Bones news?

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Ryan Gosling Cast in The Lovely Bones

BuzzSugar — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 16:33:31 -0700

Wow!
The cast for Peter Jackson's film version of The Lovely Bones is shaping up beautifully: Ryan Gosling has just been added to the cast, joining the recently added Rachel Weisz.

Variety says:
"Based on Alice Sebold's novel, storyline revolves around a young girl who has been murdered and watches over her family - and killer - from heaven. Girl must weigh her desire for vengeance against her desire for her family to heal. Gosling will play the girl's father; Weisz plays the mother."

Wow!
Peter Jackson, Rachel Weisz and now Ryan Gosling? Sure, Gosling seems a little on the young side (ahem, 26) to have a 14-year-old daughter, but that's forgivable. I am anxiously waiting to find out who they cast as Susie. Who could do that role justice?

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NY Magazine Already Panning The Lovely Bones

BuzzSugar — Mon, 07 May 2007 15:14:56 -0700

Last week I brought you the news that Peter Jackson has written a screenplay adaptation of Alice Sebold's novel The Lovely Bones, a story told from the viewpoint of a 14-year-old girl who was raped and murdered. All Jackson neeeded was a studio to give him the money - and a lot of it. Variety claims the budget for Bones could run close to $90 million. Well, Jackson got someone to bite: DreamWorks.

So what will $90 million get you? New York Magazine has already reviewed Jackson's screenplay and the verdict is not great. Noting Jackson's successful fantasy-drama Heavenly Creatures, the New York Magazine writer figured The Lovely Bones would be equally promising. Not so, apparently.

Jackson doesn't get into Susie's head the way he did Pauline and Juliet's, and the incursion of the supernatural into everyday life feels showy rather than integral. The fantasy scenes in Heavenly Creatures were momentous, despite the shakiness of the special effects; though it's certain that the effects in The Lovely Bones will be brilliant, the scenes in Heaven, and Susie's interaction with Earth, don't have much magic on the page.

It certainly seems premature to dis on a movie that has a long way to go before it's a presentable film ready for critique, though I can't deny this article makes me slightly nervous for The Lovely Bones.

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Peter Jackson: Writer/Director of The Lovely Bones?

BuzzSugar — Tue, 01 May 2007 15:00:03 -0700

In the most intriguing movie news of the day, Peter Jackson has co-written a screenplay adaptation of Alice Sebold's heart-wrenching novel The Lovely Bones and is looking for a studio to back the project. The mastermind behind the Lord of the Rings trilogy and the latest King Kong remake has long had The Lovely Bones in mind, according to Variety:

Jackson scooped up the film rights to "Bones" from FilmFour in 2004. (FilmFour is still a partner on the project.) Since then, the filmmaker has insisted that "Bones" would be his next directing project after "King Kong."

It seems like a huge leap to go from such grandiose fantastical box office sweepers like LOTR series to a quiet family drama about the rape and murder of a 14-year-old girl. The story has clearly struck a chord in him which makes me intensely curious to see what Jackson will do with this. I think it actually might turn out to be great.

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The Lovely Bones: A Fractured Fairy Tale

BuzzSugar — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 05:30:00 -0800

I've long questioned Hollywood's desire to bring Alice Sebold's novel The Lovely Bones to the big screen. The book itself delicately straddles tragedy and beauty in its first-person account of a 14-year-old girl who is murdered and watches her family's unraveling from Heaven. Though I held out hope that Peter Jackson would be able to balance the same themes, it was all for naught: his big-screen version of The Lovely Bones is ambitious, but irredeemably disturbing.

I'd heard that Jackson left out the fact that his main character, Susie Salmon (played by Saoirse Ronan), is raped in the book, and that the murder occurs offscreen, which made a certain amount of sense - it's not necessary to show either to convince you that her ordeal is terrifying. But after seeing the film, it baffles me that Jackson chose to include other grisly scenes and imagery. What's even more questionable is the portrayal of Susie's "in-between" - her purgatory on the way to Heaven that's sometimes a perfect world and other times hellish.

Had Jackson chosen instead to focus on the ordeal of the Salmon family after Susie's departure - the most compelling part of the movie - I think he would have had a chance at making something more powerful. To see what I mean, just read more.

Susie's cartoonish in-between detracts from the performances of her family members back on earth, particularly Mark Wahlberg's. As her anguished father who is coping with Susie's murder by hunting for clues, Wahlberg impresses more than costar Stanley Tucci, who earned a Golden Globe nomination for the role. Tucci's portrayal of Mr. Harvey, I'm sad to say, goes over the top - with his obvious wig, facial prosthetics and unintentionally goofy laugh, it borders on caricature.

Susan Sarandon appears solely to steal scenes as the family's pill-popping, boozehound Grandma, imparting a lightness on the film that Susie's world tries for, but fails to convey. Indeed, when the focus shifts away from the supernatural to document the fissures that afflict the Salmon family, we get somewhere. Just as quickly, though, those scenes of substance are pulled away from you, and we're back to Susie's confounding half-life.

Instead of spending so much time on a nightmarish land of CGI, Jackson should have worried more about giving the characters more satisfying scenes of closure - that's what would have made the audience feel better about Susie's fate.

Photo courtesy of Dreamworks

Which Books Should Never Have Been Made Into Movies?

BuzzSugar — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 07:30:00 -0800

I read Alice Sebold's tragic novel The Lovely Bones when it came out in 2002 and loved it; so why was I so nervous to hear that Peter Jackson was adapting the book into a movie two years ago? I didn't know how the central act - Susie Salmon's rape and murder - would be handled onscreen.

The film is being released tomorrow and it sounds like my fears might have been justified - some early reviews complain that the central crimes have been toned down for the film version. It's not that I want to see these graphic scenes, but it seems wrong to neglect the horrific events the book hinges on. In fact, I would just as well have not seen this novel adapted at all given the highly sensitive subject matter.

This happens a lot - we all have gripes about filmmakers changing aspects of books for their cinematic counterparts, but what about when it's not just an aspect - what about entire books that should have never made it to the big screen? It's hard cramming hundreds of pages into two hours; it's even more difficult translating certain aspects that may only work on the page. In recent years, the adaptations of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and The Time Traveler's Wife disappointed me so much. It wasn't that I thought the films could have been different, it's that I thought that perhaps they never should have been turned into movies at all. Tell me: are there any books that you thought should never have been adapted?