Beautiful Creatures Movie Review
Saturday, February 23, 2013
Another movie based on a young American adult novel by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, and the first book in the Caster Chronicles series.
Well, if you're going to tell me that this is another "TWILIGHT saga"
series then you're dead right! :-)
The difference is, iit's not about vampires this time, it's about witchery, witch
craft, love, good vs evil and more.
I haven't read the book so boo me but based on the movie, maybe I missed
the fun although I think the movie is actually good, not boring, I enjoyed the British accent though. Beautiful Creatures is from the director Richard LaGravenese (Freedom Writers).
Beautiful Creatures plot, along with the larger “Caster Chronicles,” centers around Ethan Lawson Wate (Alden Ehrenreich), a high school junior who falls for new girl, Lena Duchannes (Alice Englert), in the small-town community of Gatlin, South Carolina. A withdrawn and mysterious girl, Lena eventually reveals to Ethan that she is a “Caster” – a magical being who, on her sixteenth birthday, will be “claimed” as a force for light or dark.
On one side, Lena’s uncle, Macon Ravenwood (Jeremy Irons) advocates for the light while her mother, Sarafine (Emma Thompson), tempts Lena with the power of the dark side (for lack of a better phrase). As the days count down until Lena’s birthday and subsequent “Claiming,” Ethan must help her confront dark urges as well as uncover a long-buried connection between Casters and his own family –
if he wants to keep his new-found love from going dark.
Although the Romeo and Juliet-like romance between young Ethan and Lena is the heart of the story, this is a movie in which the grown-up characters have all the fun. I love the setting though and the effects were nice.
Devoted book fans hoping for a super-faithful adaptation are out of luck; writer-director Richard LaGravenese has taken considerable liberties to streamline the nearly 600-page novel into a two-hour film that leaves you wondering what will happen next. But he's kept the overall themes and (most) major characters -- including the lush, Southern setting with its oppressive heat and even more oppressive attitudes. The leads are both appealing, and their romance is refreshingly sweet and tender -- as opposed to obsessive and controlling, as is so common in the genre. The end doesn't provide a satisfying closure, so if another great cast could be summoned, a sequel wouldn't be unwelcome. :-)
Watch the Trailer here:
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