Elizabethtown (2005)

Originally Reviewed 

Tuesday February 21, 2006

 

Elizabethtown is one of those films you must have extreme patience to watch because of the fact the beginning is so horrible that after about 10 minutes of watching many people will have the urge to shut it off and chalk it up to a bad rental. But if you give this film a little time the growth of the story and characters transforms Elizabethtown into an extraordinarily entertaining film which surprised me after such a awful start.

Drew Baylor (Orlando Bloom) is a designer for a major shoe company, for eight years he has been working on a design that he hopes will revolutionize the shoe business and the way people live. Unfortunately when the shoe is finally released it tanks big time, the public hates it and thinks it’s totally ridiculous. The company puts all the blame on Drew and keeps pushing the fact that his design has lost them almost a billion dollars. Its just like a big company, blaming the small guy for everything when in all actuality they were the ones who indeed thought it was a good enough design otherwise why would they have manufactured them!?! Drew is forced to do an interview for a magazine taking full responsibility for his creation and then sent packing.

With the last eight years of his life now down the toilet Drew goes home and plans to end it all, until he gets a call from his sister who tells him their father just died of a heart attack visiting his brother in Elizabethtown, Kentucky. Drew is sent to Kentucky to retrieve the body of his father and warned to not get involved with his father's side of the family, whom his mother says resents her for taking his father away from Elizabethtown. Drew boards a plane to Louisville, Kentucky where he meets Claire (Kirsten Dunst) a flight attendant who decides to constantly ramble on about peoples names, and takes it upon herself to draw him maps of where he needs to go.

Arriving at Elizabethtown, Drew begins to realize how much his father was loved by the town; everyone seems to know of Drew and his "success" in shoe design, since the bad news has not yet been published. That night Drew, wanting to talk to someone, calls up Claire (the over zealous flight attendant who left him her number) because no one else seems to be answering their phone. The two stay up all night talking to each other about life, love and family.

Throughout the rest of the film Drew begins to realize that failure is a part of life. He begins to learn more about his father, who he never found the time to get to know, who was obviously very proud of him. Drew begins to realize that he does have something to offer and that even though he feels alone there are people out there that care for him, and he therefore does have something to live for.

Elizabethtown is a very enjoyable and touching story about a guy who has given up on life, and through the death of his father he begins to realize that there is so much in life that is worth living. As I stated in the beginning if you can get through the extremely horrible beginning of this film you'll be pleasantly surprised at the remainder of the film. In my opinion cutting out or rewriting the first 25 minutes would have made it extensively better. Cameos by Alec Baldwin and Jessica Biel only add to the awful introduction, their lines are terrible and they only make the beginning even worse. It really begins to feel like the first half hour belongs to an entirely different film. Not only is the story and dialogue a whole lot better, but the acting and the character's personalities are completely different.

Kirsten Dunst's performance is horrible in the beginning, her southern accent is so embellished that it becomes almost insulting, then as the film progresses she becomes less annoying and her accent disappears more and more. The scene on the plane is ridiculous in the sense that Drew is the only passenger! Only in the Twilight Zone would it be realistic for someone to have an entire 747 to themselves... I would like to know the name of the airline because I would fly with them all the time.

In the end, I'm glad I gave Elizabethtown a shot and didn't shut it off 20 minutes through. The final hour is definitely worth the horrible beginning; the music in the film is quite good and adds a lot to the film. If the beginning had been better I would have no problem with giving this film a 9.  The writers screwed up big on that because it's the beginning that grabs people’s intention and retain it, but in this film it will ultimately lose a lot of viewers who otherwise might have ended up enjoying it. 

8/10