Review of The Majestic (2001) by Parker M — 27 May 2011

2.5 Stars out of 4.

There is something rather uplifting in watching movies about movie going. It creates the nostalgia of when films started to be appreciated as art and immersed people to the point they forgot they were sitting in a theatre. The Majestic isn't quite a film about such, though it treats the movie going experience as a symbol in the background to a very pensive yet meandering old fashioned post-war romance.

Remember Frank Capra? Well, Frank Darabont - the director of The Shawshank Redemption - brings back the gliding optimism and unstoppable high spirits of Capra's romantic works. Think It's A Wonderful Life but embedded in a town that is not so wonderful. What Darabont has gone for is a retreat to Capra romanticism, escaping the age of Rambo iconography. This is a film without bullets, grim death, or pointless explosions. It's a settled, passionate story that - at its heart - is a real slog. It's too long so most of its yearning and romanticism is replaced with impatience as the film counts its minutes.

Indeed it is too long and it may be too audacious for how Darabont designs the narrative. This is best envisioned as a love story about a man discovering himself amidst an era of misbegotten American identity. But a lot of that is lost within a film that jumps from theme to theme and rambles on for over two-and-a-half hours. That's too much Capra!

So thus introduces Darabont's The Majestic, a film of many sorts. It pursues many paths: a story of love, war, alienation, and even McCarthyism. It's a lot to cover, considering the film plays out in simple, self-effaced, and predictable fashion. I want to call this a classic love story of epic proportions and then award it three stars. But I cannot. Darabont juggles so much disparate material in rather modest exposition that The Majestic tumbles along for its hefty runtime and leaves us smiling and wanting more of the less.

Jim Carry plays young and aspiring B-movie writer Peter Appleton, who is very proud of his new hit release Sand Pirates of the Sahara. His newest work, Ashes To Ashes, is despised by the producers and Appleton's involvement in an anti-war protest in college makes him a target of the Communist witch hunts. So he flees but finds himself crashing into and off a bridge and waking up on dry land with amnesia. The last thing a writer wants.

He is accompanied into the town of Lawson, where a man named Harry (Martin Landau) insists Peter is his lost son, Luke, who fought during World War 2. "Luke" also had a girlfriend named Adele Stanton (Laurie Holden) who is unsure Peter is really Luke but her love for him comes in a free fall. Nevertheless, Peter as Luke brings a symbol of hope to Lawson, a turn sacked by years of sadness and death. Of course Peter, due to the amnesia, is not sure who he is and joins the town until his thoughts inevitably unravel.

The Majestic is particularly interesting in its first half because Darabont sets up a story that's greatest tragedy is that it is inspiring. We know Peter is not Luke and the town not knowing that and mistaking him for good fortune is the real tear jerker. The Majestic is better as a study of the dilemma of having a lost human personality amend a community's lost one. It's a fascinating irony that makes the film rather bitter-sweet than just a schmaltzy love tale.

When the town bands together to reopen the abandoned theatre "The Majestic" one cannot help but think Darabont is manifesting the greatest symbol of the movie: the new-found discovery of hope and strength of rural America represented through the tall, stable, positive, and awe-inspiring movie theatre. Cinema brings happiness back into the Lawson folk's lives and it is all an accident. If Peter finds his true self again, the town is doomed losing that essence of hope.

This is the central element of The Majestic that keeps it somewhat engaging. Oddly, Frank Darabont attempts to extend the already sufficient material into something more broad and politically relevant. Is it really needed? The film, what could have been a fascinating, schematic love story becomes an overlong haul to the politically correct finish line. The story is indeed predictable, but the film loses its energy when Darabont, I think, wants it to really pick up.

This is perhaps Carrey's most restrained performance. He underplays Peter (or Luke) appropriately, filling his character with emptiness and obscured memories. His amnesia renders him on a blank slate and - thus - Carrey plays a character, romantically parallel to a John Gilbert, who discovers his true personality as the film moves along. Eventually Darabont obfuscates Appleton's character in exchange for studying the 1950's McCarthyism, which pushes The Majestic from nostalgia to a rambling lecture.

The Majestic is a contrived movie and wanders to a conclusion that could not happen unless the script had its occasional flaws. I still think Darabont is an excellent storyteller whose The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile are quite great films. With The Majestic expect a very simple premise tinkering in an epic. Also expect a brief insertion of a scene from King Vidor's The Big Parade, starring John Gilbert. So I was not lying when implying The Majestic is more than two movies in one.