This movie won three Oscars the other night: Visual Effects, Makeup, and Art Direction. I don't think it deserved any of those, let alone the nominations. Of course it's obvious to pretty much everyone that the Academy doesn't award Oscars based on merit; it's all a political puddle of slime. Ben Button is a movie formulated to win an Oscar. It has all the marks of a winner; lots of heart-warming moments, little in the way of substance, and a bunch of pretty people engaging in wrenching romantic foibles.
As you probably know, the story revolves around Benjamin Button and his highly unlikely predicament of aging backwards. This of course brings all sorts of emotional stress to the table as most of his friends get older and die while he gets younger. Goody goody. Of course there's a girl who he's destined to love in a star-crossed sort of way. Blah blah, you get the picture. There have been comparisons made to the storyline of Forrest Gump, and I do not disagree with them in the slightest. It's actually pretty shameless how much of the formula they've lifted for this thing.
Thankfully it didn't win Best Picture, although it was nominated. Having just seen it today I am very very glad that it didn't win, and I'm actually a little appalled that it made it that far. I guess you could say that it deserved the awards it did win; however, it won Visual Effects for the CG head plastered on little old Ben in the early parts of the film, and I think it looked horrible. The baby looked like some sort of rubber Buddha doll or something, not believable in the slightest. Coupled with the crappy delivery of crappy lines in crappy fake accents, the CG head was laughable. Sure, I'm sure it took a lot of work to get it to look as real as it did, but I think it sucked.
Perhaps my biggest complaint with the film was the voice acting. The only believable voice in the whole movie was Daisy's daughter, staying by her side as she belted her horrendous old-lady narration. The daughter sounded like a real person; I guess that's because she wasn't constrained by a fake accent. Everyone else looked like a bunch of floating heads with words floating through them to the listener.
I liked some of it, but every time a smile creeped onto my face it was dashed by the sheer fluff and fakeness of it all that would always rise up afterwards. It's overlong and pointless. Watch it if you want to waste two and a half hours.
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