HEARTS IN ATLANTIS (2001) Sinking hearts, is that the idea? I used to use the term "guy-jerker" to describe movies which are constructed like tearjerkers (y'know, chick flicks) but are aimed at men. Then I realized that these movies have always been around - sports movies. Man, this is why I hate sports movies. Guy-jerkers I've historically kinda liked, though. It's 'cuz I'm such a big softie. I liked this one, mostly, but not that enthusiastically. I might've a few years ago, when I was diggin' The Green Mile too, but maybe, like cheese left on the counter, I'm getting hard and crusty in my old age. Hearts In Atlantis doesn't open very well, with a modern-day prologue with David Morse as Robert Garfield, giving us awful voice-over narration about how childhood days lasted forever. He returns to his now dilapidated childhood home to attend a funeral and looks back on those days, 1962 specifically, back when he was called Bobby, looked just like Anton Yelchin, lived with his mom (Hope Davis), didn't know much about his dad beyond what his mom tells him, and had two dear friends who mean more to him than anything. Then his mom accepts a mysterious boarder, one Ted Brautigan played by Anthony Hopkins. At first he seems like a fairly likeable old geezer (he often mumbles cryptic things while staring off into the distance, as if having taken inspiration from Richard Burton in Exorcist II) but he starts demonstrating some odd, seemingly telepathic skills, and he advises Bobby with some VERY specific instructions on looking out for some shadowy badguys called the Low Men. The kid and the old man commence the bonding. Hearts In Atlantis is (surprise, surprise) based on a novel by Stephen King, who seems to have gone from Mr. Horror to Mr. Sensitive Fantasy Guy. Actually, it's only based on the first act of that novel, the rest of which continues to follow these kids around through Vietnam and into adulthood. Most of the film strikes me as familiar from the book, but there are a few different things I recall, like how in the book Brautigan recommends the book The Exorcist to the boy and then remembers that it hasn't been written yet (!). The book also had a few more annoying references/tie-ins to King's Dark Tower series, which always annoyed me, because I haven't read that series yet and besides, it strikes me as masturbatory to keep trying to draw attention to such a clearly separate work. Like those cheesy heavy metal songs that list off half the song titles in that band's career (Manowar's "Blood Of The Kings", Megadeth's "Victory"). Annoying, but I admit I otherwise like the songs, and the book. Also, the fate of Carol, Bobby's female friend, is quite different than in the book - I actually much prefer the movie's. The book's was pure cheese. The child actors are good, and Hopkins is pretty low-key for Hopkins - maybe he's sleepwalking, maybe he's just being low-key. Hope Davis probably has the hardest job, playing a woman who seems to genuinely love her son but clearly just isn't cut out for the motherhood business (she putzes out on the kid's birthday, but she doesn't seem to enjoy it). Early in the film, her dialogue clumsily shoehorns in a story about how Bobby's dad blew all his money on gambling and ran off. She actually does this more than once, like a refrain she blurts out every time she wants to keep the kid in line, tipping us off that maybe she's not being entirely forthcoming. The movie's missteps, I think, are in the good vs. evil conflicts. The whole idea of the Low Men is left pretty damn vague by film's end, and meanwhile, there are two nominal, more mundane villains. The child villain is a vile boy who's only here to be despicable and then get two comeuppances, one including a tiresome bit of pop psychology (homophobes = homosexuals in denial) which I don't buy now any more than I did in American Beauty. (I mean, are anti-Semites Jews in denial? Gimme a break - assholes are usually just assholes) The other villain, the mom's boss, is even worse, and gets no such comeuppance, or much resolution at all. Hearts In Atlantis feels unfinished, and I don't mean like one chapter of a larger story, as in the book. The title isn't even relevant to this portion of the book, so the words are worked clumsily into the movie so people wouldn't say "What was with the title?" People are in too much of a rush to film King's books these days. He's got like forty of them now, and most of them could've been adapted better than they were. Instead of rushing something like this into production, isn't it time for a classy update on...well, take your pick. BACK TO THE H's BACK TO THE MAIN PAGE