Collateral Beauty (9/10)

by Tony Medley

Runtime 93 minutes.

OK for children.

This is a heart-wrenching metaphysical movie with a terrific cast comprised of Jamie Foxx, Keira Knightley, Kate Winslet, Edward Norton, Naomi Harris, Michael Peña, and the incomparable Helen Mirren, among others.

I went into this film the way I like to going to movies, knowing absolutely nothing about it, so it had a heavy impact on me. As a result, I’m going to tell even less about the plot than I usually do (and I rarely say anything about the plot).

Jamie Foxx is the leader of a tech firm, whose junior partners are Norton and Winslet. He loses his 6 year old daughter and never recovers from his depression which keeps getting worse. Norton and Winslet want to sell the firm because they need the money but Foxx is basically catatonic. They devise a plan to get his approval, which involves Knightley, Mirren, and Jacob Latimore.

There was only one criticism that I had of the movie. Near the end, when something emotional happens, Edward Norton’s character says, “I need a drink.” This reminds me of the old time films when everybody lit up a cigarette. Of course in those days the cigarette companies paid for product placement to inspire everyone who viewed movies that smoking was a sophisticated thing to do.

Alcoholism is such a problem today and it’s rarely mentioned. This line sounds like something that the makers of spirits paid to be in the movie to make people think that when something good or bad happens, having a drink is the thing that will make you feel better. Not. I wish they’d cut it out the film, something that would be easy to do.

Other than that director David Frankel has produced a well-paced movie from an original screenplay by Alan Loeb. It’s one that will cause you to leave the theater thinking and wiping tears from your eyes, and neither of those are bad things.