"August Rush"

Thanks to RomeHater for the plug on his blog, Rome, NY Sucks. When I was first looking to start a local blog, his was the first I found. Unfortunately I haven't found many others! Our area always seems to be trailing behind the rest of the states in all areas. Hopefully with the Griffiss Technology Park blooming we'll see more local citizens embracing and using this public space.

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In my boredom tonight I decided to go see what was playing at the theater. I'm old enough to remember when Rome Cinema didn't exist, and our choices were between nightly showings at the West-Rome drive-in and matinees at The Capitol.

Faced with a one-hour wait until the next showing at the Rome Cinema 8, I decided to drive to New Hartford. They have more theaters at their location, not to mention much more comfortable seats!

The movie selection is pretty bad at the moment. Outside of the fact that most of the movies are family-oriented and Christmas films, the plots just left me uninspired. Blame it on the writer's guild strike, I guess.

It came down to "American Gangster" or "August Rush", and I settled on the latter.

The movie revolves around an 11 year-old orphan boy August (Freddie Highmore) who runs away from his group home to find his parents. His mother, a cellist for the NY Philharmonic; and father, lead singer/composer of a rock band; had a one-night stand where little August was conceived. They lose touch, and through a freak accident, the mother is left to believe that her baby was killed (when in fact it was secretly given up for adoption by her father).

What this leaves us with is three seemingly connected people (August, his father and mother) leading separate lives. The movie bounces between the three, and we see where paths cross and opportunities are missed time and again.

The movie moved fast, maybe too fast. At times it felt like there should be more to the scenes, and it left me wondering how much the director cut from the film. Music plays a central role to the whole movie, as August (through superior genes) is somewhat of a musical genius. The whole movie slowly takes on a bit of a fairy-tale feel, and it almost gets away from us if not for the more serious themes in the movie.

Wizard (Robin Williams) is a street-kid-musician pimp who snatches August off the streets. Imagine all the worst qualities of the Artful Dodger mixed with the eccentricity of Robin Williams. For some time he plays the part of a somewhat likable bad guy. This deteriorates as he exploits August's musical talents for cash, and becomes convincingly evil.

I didn't enjoy the movie as much as I hoped I would. Maybe because I'm not a musician, and this movie seems to play so heavily to music. This is one I won't be renting again when it comes out on video