The Lovely Bones (2009)
Average Rating: 5/10
Reviews Counted: 230
Fresh: 74 | Rotten: 156
It's stuffed full of Peter Jackson's typically dazzling imagery, but The Lovely Bones suffers from abrupt shifts between horrific violence and cloying sentimentality.
Average Rating: 4.9/10
Critic Reviews: 44
Fresh: 13 | Rotten: 31
It's stuffed full of Peter Jackson's typically dazzling imagery, but The Lovely Bones suffers from abrupt shifts between horrific violence and cloying sentimentality.
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Average Rating: 3.2/5
User Ratings: 350,669
My Rating
Movie Info
Fourteen-year-old Susie Salmon (Saoirse Ronan) is just experiencing the pangs of first love when she's viciously murdered by her neighbor Mr. Harvey (Stanley Tucci), a predatory wolf with a deceptively mundane appearance. As her family slowly begins drifting apart while struggling to make sense of their loss, Susie bravely attempts to find her footing in the hereafter. Meanwhile, down on earth, Mr. Harvey is feeling confident that he's covered his tracks well enough to get away with the crime,
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Cast
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Mark Wahlberg
Jack Salmon -
Rachel Weisz
Abigail Salmon -
Susan Sarandon
Grandma Lynn -
Stanley Tucci
George Harvey -
Michael Imperioli
Len Fenerman -
Saoirse Ronan
Susie Salmon -
Rose McIver
Lindsey Salmon -
Christian Ashdale
Buckley Salmon -
Reece Ritchie
Ray Singh -
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The Lovely Bones Trailer & Photos
All Critics (230) | Top Critics (44) | Fresh (75) | Rotten (158) | DVD (7)
Jackson seems more at home in the afterlife than in this one, rendering this off-kilter project creepy and pretentious.
Top CriticSome books should stay between their covers, and The Lovely Bones may well be one of them.
Understand, the film still has power, just not as much as it should.
The movie is often wise.
This is a distractingly busy movie, so in love with its own considerable craft that it can't stay still long enough for anything to settle in.
Jackson's grand, computer-generated vision of Susie's Dali-like "in between," while occasionally gorgeous, leaves the viewer feeling stuck between two worlds, too. The story suffers.
Your own peace will come after you walk out, trying hard not to laugh at how crazy-bad it all is.
Unshackled by earthly restraints, Jackson shifts his Weta toolsets into overdrive in a more-is-more free-for-all frenzy.
The Lovely Bones is probably a much better idea for a book than it is a movie, but it's still a very good one, and those don't come along too often.
The talented cast struggles with, and is eventually failed by, the material. They are not aided by their director either, who seemingly stood slightly off screen and urged them to 'act bigger!'
I had a few bones to pick with the story.
The film is such a misfire, such a disappointing collection of failed attempts at emotional affect and confounding storytelling choices, that it seems more like a bad director's attempt to rip off Jackson's style than his own work.
No hay manera de tomarse en serio, al menos no en el marco de una película que debió ser perturbadora y conmovedora en partes iguales, la serie de momentos Kodak imposibles con que Peter Jackson intenta retratar la vida después de la muerte.
Only Tucci's chilling, truly scarier than Hannibal Lechter psychopath holds the far too fanciful scenario together, bolted to planet earth as best he can.
Only Tucci's chilling, truly scarier than Hannibal Lechter psychopath holds the far too fanciful scenario together, bolted to planet earth as best he can.
The whole plays better than that would suggest, largely due to Jackson's imagination and commanding skill.
Pet peeves and stylistic differences of opinion work against Heavenly Creatures director
For all the efforts of a fine cast, Jackson never gives his human drama the desperation and frustration it calls for...
Interview with Rose McIver of The Lovely Bones: "It was terrifying to see [Stanley Tucci] transform on screen into someone so utterly different from himself."
While technically accomplished, exhibiting flashes of Jackson's idiosyncratic taste, it is frequently sentimental, softhearted, and diffuse. (Blu-ray Ediiton)
I never read the novel, so I have no idea if it is as tedious as Peter Jackson's movie.
Artistically and technically, this film is superb, rich in excellent performances, wondrous visuals and compelling ideas. Yet for all its brilliance, The Lovely Bones remains elusive.
Audience Reviews for The Lovely Bones
Super Reviewer
Super Reviewer
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- Abigail Salmon: I loved the way a photo could capture a moment before it was gone.
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- George Harvey: Ducks... It's all about concealment, the art of concealment and staying up late waiting in the hours of the dark...
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- Susie Salmon: Nobody notices when we leave. I mean, the moment when we really choose to go. At best you might feel a whisper, or the wave of a whisper, undulating down.
- Susie Salmon: My name is Salmon, like the fish. First name: Susie. I was fourteen years old when I was murdered on December 6th, 1973. I was here for a moment, and then I was gone. I wish you all, a long, and happy life.
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- Susie Salmon: I was in the blue horizon between heaven and earth. The days were unchanging, and every night I dreamt the same dream. The smell of damp earth. The scream no one heard. The sound of my heart beating like a hammer against cloth, and I would hear them calling, the voices of the dead. I wanted to follow them to find a way out but I would always come back to the same door. And I was afraid. I knew if I went in there I would never come out.
Discussion Forum
| Topic | Last Post | Replies |
|---|---|---|
| Did anyone else feel that Jackson entirely missed the focus of this book...? | 26 days ago | 0 |
| ? | 26 days ago | 3 |
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Foreign Titles
- In meinem Himmel (DE)
- Lovely Bones (FR)
