Robert Zemeckis’ legacy in the film industry is one that is accentuated by his ambition to advance the medium and attempt things that others aren’t even thinking about let alone trying. From the blend of live-action and animation in Who Framed Roger Rabbit to the split production of Cast Away to his run ensconced in the world of performance capture (The Polar Express, Beowulf, A Christmas Carol), his work traditionally doesn’t settle for simple storytelling; he has demonstrated a passion for showing audiences something on the big screen that they’ve never seen before.
Here
Release Date: November 1, 2024
Directed By: Robert Zemeckis
Written By: Eric Roth and Robert Zemeckis
Starring: Tom Hanks, Robin Wright, Paul Bettany, and Kelly Reilly
Rating: PG-13 for thematic material, some suggestive material, brief strong language and smoking
Runtime: 104 minutes
That will never go underappreciated, as that kind of creativity will forever be necessary in the art form, and his latest, Here, is very much part of that tradition. It’s a non-linear narrative that takes place across eons and makes heavy use of de-aging/aging effects, but most significantly, the film unfolds from a fixed perspective, with one angle capturing events that take place in a single spot across thousands of years. Adapting the visual style of the graphic novel of the same name by writer/artist Richard McGuire, the film is undeniably a standout filmmaking effort and a work made with great skill – but the hook proves to not have the staying power necessary for a 104 minute runtime. The commitment to the aesthetic is by itself awesome, but what’s actually unfolding in front of the static camera lacks the same kind of impressiveness, and it takes a major toll on the overall experience.
Written by Robert Zemeckis and Eric Roth, who memorably last collaborated on 1994’s Forrest Gump, Here’s narrative is constantly jumping through time, with mini arcs set before the founding of America, during the Revolutionary War and both the early 20th and 21st centuries, but the principal focus is on the Young family, which moves into the house located on the movie’s single spot in the aftermath of World War II.
Al (Paul Bettany) and Rose Young (Kelly Reilly) raise their family in the home, including their oldest son Richard (Tom Hanks), and after a teenage Richard meets Margaret (Robin Wright), the girl who proves to be the love of his life, they inherent the property and raise a family of their own.
On a technical level, Here is an impressive achievement.
First and foremost, Here is a notable filmmaking experiment, and there is an argument to be made for its success simply it’s the movie’s coherency: in addition to it regularly flipping back and forth through time, there are also on-screen boxes that give windows into the past or future, and while less masterful hands could render this aesthetic a confusing mess, Zemeckis has earned his reputation as one of the best modern directors. You mentally adjust to what it’s doing through the early scenes, and once you understand its rhythm, you can easily understand when everything is taking place and the larger context of the period.
The age changing of the characters proves to be a mixed bag. There are some scenes when it’s wowing how Tom Hanks and Robin Wright look like their younger selves, but there are other points where it’s a distraction (not unlike Robert Zemeckis’ battle with the uncanny valley in his performance capture films). On the whole, however, it is more convincing than the aging of Al and Rose, as strong performances from Paul Bettany and Kelly Reilly can’t make up for unconvincing physicality.
Here operates as though its aesthetics make up for its generic story… but they don’t.
As I’ve hopefully expressed here, it’s easy to be grateful for Zemeckis’ ambition with Here, but there proves to be a fatal flaw in the design. While it’s appreciated that the filmmaker would try something so challenging, it doesn’t compensate for a generic story about an ordinary American family. There’s conflict introduced – like Richard being forced to abandon his dreams of being an artist so that he can support his family, and Margaret’s desire for their family to move and get their own home – but there isn’t anything that is unique or particularly compelling, and their impact is undercut by the film’s breezy pacing. Beyond the fact that they are there to follow, there’s nothing about the Young family that demands true emotional investment from the audience.
The irony is that the film has much more interesting material in the subplots to which it pays less attention – as Here bounces to different time periods before returning to the Youngs. This includes Lee (David Lynn) and Stella Beekman (Ophelia Lovibond), who live in the house before Al and Rose and are a freewheeling couple with a big ambition: to sell Lee’s design for a new kind of reclining living room chair. Before them there is John (Gwilym Lee) and Pauline Marter (Michelle Dockery), who fight constantly because the latter doesn’t feel the former’s hobby flying planes is safe, and after them are the Devon (Nicholas Pinnock) and Helen Harris (Nikki Amuka-Bird) and their son Justin (Cache Vanderpuye), who live in the house during the whole mess that was 2020.
All of these stories and others are better than what the movie mostly focuses on, and that means having the weird cinematic experience of being disappointed when Tom Hanks and Robin Wright are back on screen.
Without much emotional weight to speak of beyond its very broad and generic swings, Here is a style over substance exercise for Robert Zemeckis. This isn’t to say that it doesn’t have value, as the style is impressive – but it doesn’t leave much of an impact. It’s a movie worth seeing once just to witness the way it is able to operate and respect the craft that went into it, but in the immediate aftermath of my screening, the idea of ever revisiting it feels unnecessary.