Review of Stone (2010) by Maksim B — 07 Apr 2011

An extremely challenging philosophical and psychological drama, Stone is an uneasy movie, which differs from the mainstream Hollywood deliveries and clearly is not for every taste.

Nothing really gives an initial idea of the philosophical and existential content of Stone in the beginning of the movie. The early expectations of a prison drama are slowly put aside by what seems to be an attempt by the convict Edward Norton and his wife Milla Jovovich to influence the parole decision of the prison psychologist veteran Robert De Niro who is just about to retire.

However, instead of turning into a thriller or drama, John Curran leads Stone to the murky waters of morality, religion, ethics and philosophy. The four leads in the movie zig-zag between internal peace, fear, calm, lust and religious questioning in what seems to become an extremely slow-paced and difficult to follow movie. De Niro, Norton, Jovovich and Conroy do manage to adequately perform and to strengthen the overall unpleasant and depressive environment in which Stone is set.

Director Curran delves even deeper and at a certain point the story turns into a philosophical and religious mess, from which extracting the essence is an extremely difficult task. This results in a final which may disappoint or bore many.

Hard movie to see, even harder to follow, with no guarantees for cinematographic satisfaction, but worth giving a try if you would like to challenge yourself.