Miss Flicks

Here: Film Review

With Here, Tom Hanks reunites with not only his Forrest Gump co-star Robin Wright after 30 years but their director Robert Zemeckis, screenwriter Eric Roth and cinematographer Don Burgess.

The drama, based on the graphic novel by Richard McGuire, tells the story of a piece of land and its inhabitants over the years. It is primarily set in the living room of a house and depicts the lives of its residents over the generations. The main focus is on the Young family, led by Al (Paul Bettany) and Rose (Kelly Reilly), and their three children, particularly their eldest son Richard (Hanks) who has his girlfriend Margaret (Wright) move in when she falls pregnant.

Here has good intentions and its heart is in the right place. I liked the concept of telling universal human stories by putting the camera in a living room and observing what happens. But the conceit is also its downfall. By making the camera stationary in one corner of the room, the action feels like a play, like the actors are walking onto a stage when they enter the frame. They also deliver their lines theatrically and unnaturally, particularly Bettany.

The film uses new generative AI technology to de-age the actors in real-time as they perform instead of using digital effects in post-production. The technology has certainly come a long way but it’s not 100% right yet. Stop trying to make us think 68-year-old Hanks is 18 years old! He has the physicality right and obviously the clothes and hair help but I never believed him to be that young. The voice is a dead giveaway and the faces are unnaturally smooth. As much as I love Hanks, the concept would have worked better with younger actors or older characters.

Thankfully, they don’t stand close up to the camera that often – it makes no sense for them to randomly stand where the camera is. But because most of the action takes place further away by the sofas we feel distant from the family. I never felt fully involved or connected to their story for this reason as well as the iffy dialogue, the OTT acting and the non-linear narrative.

Much like the graphic novel, the narrative hops around in time and other residents’ stories cut into the Young’s. Occasionally they overlap by inset panels appearing within the same frame to depict things happening at different times. I enjoyed the tale of the La-Z-Boy inventor and his wife but the others didn’t add very much. Other stories taking place before the home was built – dinosaurs, indigenous people, colonialists – were baffling and unnecessary. It should have focused solely on that house or even just the Youngs.

I fully back the concept of telling a series of universal, relatable stories through the prism of an average suburban house but the static staging, imperfect AI technology and jumbled narrative stopped this from having any emotional resonance.

In cinemas from Friday 17th January