Review of Life of Pi (2012) by Foxgrove — 29 Dec 2012

Having read the book by Yann Martel and knowing that Ang Lee was at the helm, I was really looking forward to seeing Life of Pi. I thought the film would be visually stunning and an emotional roller coaster and truly expected it to be my film of the year 2012, an expectation encouraged by the brilliant trailer.

Therefore, I was very disappointed to realise that the actual movie only partially delivered. The main problem is with the adaptation of the book which many people felt was un-filmable. The novel is good, not great, but it does present the boy's willingness to embrace all religions in a very entertaining way, sometimes almost comically.

The first half of the film meanders from scene to scene giving us no reason to invest in his religious beliefs. Another problem, having read the book, is that the sequence involving the four animals in the lifeboat has been excised from the screenplay to spare us their gory and prolonged deaths.

Whilst I'm exceedingly grateful for this on the one hand, it does tend to dilute what the book did so well in showing the true horror of survival. On the positive side the film has a great asset in its young actor, Suraj Sharma, and its visual effects.

The storm sequences are the best in the film and Richard Parker, the Bengal Tiger, is a great creation. The cinematography too is, on occasion, quite beautiful. However, I am less sure about the 3D. It may have something to do with the cinema in which I saw the film, or just be due to the print under review, but I was constantly aware of a blurring of images on the periphery of scenes.

This was not only annoying, but distracting. I had to check my glasses on numerous occasions and it became an issue as the film progressed. Overall Ang Lee does make a good stab at parts of the story, including a couple of emotional moments and when the boy and tiger are alone on the open sea, but it is a case of stabbing rather than sleight of hand.