This has to be Steven Spielberg's strangest film. Maybe that's because he collaborated with Stanley Kubrick on it, and Kubrick's movies are almost all bizarre. It was another of those films I found fascinating on the first look but increasingly unlikeable on subsequent looks. It went from a "9" on the first viewing, to a "7" to a "5." In fact, I didn't even finish it on the third look.
Nonetheless, it's the typical Spielberg or Kubrick film in a number of areas, meaning great visuals, just stunning at times; a definite anti-Christian bias (that you see more and more in the carnival segment as you watch this multiple times); a very secular humanist outlook on life but a nice sentimental ending with the message that everyone needs to feel loved.
Haley Joel Osment gives one more example of why he is one of the best child actors of any era. His role is memorable and just the looks on his face would soften the hardest heart. The first of the three segments in this film was hard for me to watch in spots as the innocent Osment ("David") was framed for things by his "real brother" and then abandoned by his mother. Those are difficult scenes because the film is involving right off the bat. You really care about this young boy
The rest of the film offers fantastic visuals and an interesting, but a too Liberal- slanted story, for me to watch again. Sorry, but Spielberg and Kubrick - two men who have made some extremely entertaining films - are too bigoted for my tastes, at least in this movie.
Nonetheless, it's the typical Spielberg or Kubrick film in a number of areas, meaning great visuals, just stunning at times; a definite anti-Christian bias (that you see more and more in the carnival segment as you watch this multiple times); a very secular humanist outlook on life but a nice sentimental ending with the message that everyone needs to feel loved.
Haley Joel Osment gives one more example of why he is one of the best child actors of any era. His role is memorable and just the looks on his face would soften the hardest heart. The first of the three segments in this film was hard for me to watch in spots as the innocent Osment ("David") was framed for things by his "real brother" and then abandoned by his mother. Those are difficult scenes because the film is involving right off the bat. You really care about this young boy
The rest of the film offers fantastic visuals and an interesting, but a too Liberal- slanted story, for me to watch again. Sorry, but Spielberg and Kubrick - two men who have made some extremely entertaining films - are too bigoted for my tastes, at least in this movie.