The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, round 1.

"The Curious Case of Benjamin Button represents a richly satisfying serving of deep-dish Hollywood storytelling," writes Variety's Todd McCarthy. "This odd, epic tale of a man who ages backwards is presented in an impeccable classical manner, every detail tended to with fastidious devotion.... Due to its history-spanning structure, blank-page title character and technical sleight of hand, the film Benjamin Button most recalls is Forrest Gump, but in a good way; it is entirely possible to dislike the 1994 smash and embrace this one, which resists every opportunity for mawkish and sentimental displays. Still, it is no coincidence that Eric Roth wrote both of them, and Roth - who followed many other writers, including credited co-story author Robin Swicord, in trying to crack the long-gestating project - has veered far from the specifics of F Scott Fitzgerald's 1921 short story."

Updated through 11/26.

Button "ultimately fails to cohere as the epic tragedy it wants to be," finds Screen's Mike Goodridge. "[A]s you might expect from David Fincher, Button is far less accessible than the blockbusting syrup-fest that was Gump; its deadpan, surreal tone is more reminiscent of Big Fish, Amelie or the John Irving adaptations Hotel New Hampshire and Cider House Rules.

"If you turned Benjamin Button around and, following both the conceit of the movie and the trajectory of its main character, watched it from end to beginning, you'd wind up with the same assessment as if you watched it the normal way: really strong, a little saggy, really strong." Steven Zeitchik, blogging for the Hollywood Reporter.

Earlier: Karina Longworth at the SpoutBlog.

Updates: "I will say right now, and it pains me to do so, this is not the film everyone wanted it to be," blogs Matt Dentler. "It might be the film some wanted it to be, but the film that it is, is a safe and shallow bet. Benjamin Button takes a potentially scarring and jarring subject - mortality - and makes it a pedestrian Hallmark card."

"It may pack a more powerful punch the older you are and the more people you have lost," suggests Anne Thompson. "In that case it will score with the Academy, who will also recognize the skillful filmmaking on display."

The Playlist rounds up more reviews.

Updates, 11/25: "It sure didn't get up my nose the way Gump did," writes Glenn Kenny, "partially because of its disinclination to social commentary, and partially because it's so damn cinematically attractive that it's kind of difficult to resist on that level - but make no mistake, it's just as much of a simpering crock."

"I highly recommend the film and assume Brad Pitt has an Oscar nomination ensured for his work here," writes Drew Morton at Dr Mabuse's Kaleido-Scope.

Update, 11/26: "I confess that I've grown less tolerable of Hollywood 'whimsy; in the last decade... a personal aversion that I first noticed, coincidentally, while watching Forrest Gump in the mid-90s," writes Gabriel Shanks. "But if I've got to suffer through movies awash in easy moralizing and pat answers to life's complexities, I'd much rather do so in the company of Fincher and Pitt, who seem to share my distaste enough to try to reconstitute and recontextualize it. Good or bad, that's an incredibly admirable achievement."

Posted by dwhudson at November 24, 2008 1:50 AM