Member review

‘The Lovely Bones’ is a book-adapted film aired in 2009, depicting a fourteen-year-old girl named Suzie Salmon who died through not a tragic accident but through the sinister intentions of her neighbour George Harvey. After her death, Suzie finds herself in a place called ‘The In-betweens’. Two goals were then declared. For Suzie’s family, it is to look for her bones that were discarded by her murderer. For Suzie herself, it is to find closure before moving on from The In-betweens to heaven.

Often horrors involving murder and mystery have a dark aura throughout the whole film, and barely are there happy endings. So, when I watched ‘The Lovely Bones’, it was quite a surprise to me although I do consider it a good one as I thoroughly enjoyed it. Often genres of horror and fantasy combined would have scenes with dark tones, whereas ‘The Lovely Bones’ is able to separate the two genres within the same movie. There are scenes clearly horror and scenes that are fantasy; the transitions between the two are smoothly done but they also always transition during a time when I least expect them to. This is not necessarily bad. For a fantasy scene transitioning to horror would make me sad and a scene from horror to fantasy would make me happy and excited, as the fantasy scenes are my favourite. In other words, the movie is excellent at making me feel emotions even in such subtle ways.

The CGI is indescribable. It is amazing for a film released in 2009, so I was more than surprised when I searched up the release date. The effects and the backgrounds are fascinating to look at, it makes me feel as if I am in the movie (experiencing the beautiful moments, of course, and not the tragic and scary ones).

I also have to say that the actress who played Suzie, Saoirse Ronan, is what made the film so much better. Despite only being fourteen, she is a brilliant actress. She is Irish but is able to put on a perfect American accent. She is also great at displaying emotions. When she is smiling and happy, I only think of a happy girl and forget about her murder. When she is torn between her emotions, being angry and sad, I can sympathise with her. She also perfectly depicts the average teenager growing into adolescence, being giddy and nervous around her crush and angry with her parents, making us relate to her. Although her tragic death is something that we cannot relate to, all the more making me feel pitiful towards her. Though, perhaps my favourite character and actor is the father of Suzie, played by Mark Wahlberg. He is able to present grief to us in a way that is incredibly heart-wrenching, and to see a man cry for his daughter made the movie even more emotional. The fact that there are people cannot move on with life without Suzie made me want Suzie to come back to life, even though I knew that it was impossible.

Another thing I particularly enjoyed about this film is the pacing. The film did not go into the death immediately, rather it provided us some time to understand the background, the characters and to ease into the watching the movie. So, when Suzie actually dies, it comes to us as a shock despite the fact that she clearly mentions her death in the beginning. At times, the movie is portrayed in a light-hearted way, the movie does such a great job at it that it makes you almost forget that this is a horror and thriller. Despite it being only a 2009 movie, its quality remains high and possibly even better than modern movies in my personal opinion.