Human suffering always did make good entertainment. This one serves it up in spades. The film's nice little twist is its script, by Leslie Dixon from Catherine Ryan Hyde's novel, which pulls us forward in time, then back again, then forward again. It's dizzying, and makes the story seem a whole lot more interesting than it actually is. For the less sophisticated viewer, it will just be confusing--and this subject matter is not exactly the kind that draws crowds of intellectuals.
Its characters, well portrayed by its dream cast (Kevin Spacey, Helen Hunt, Haley Joel Osment, Jay Mohr, Angie Dickinson, etc.), are so genuinely Real because (I guess) their lives suck so bad. For example, Arlene McKinney (Hunt) has two jobs and an alcoholic mother who ditched her as a kid, is an alcoholic in rehab herself and a former battered wife to top it off. It's good to put characters through a lot of challenges but this was ridiculous. No one's life is this terrible.
New teacher Eugene Simonet (Spacey) gives his students an impossible assignment: make the world a better place. Arlene's son, Trevor (Osment), sees no reason he can't do it. From his initial action, feeding and clothing a homeless drug-addict (Jim Caviezel), is formed an idea: Perform conditional random acts of kindness. The condition is that if someone does something for you, you must do something nice for three other people. Trevor calls it "pay it forward."
Reporter Chris Chandler (Mohr) stumbles upon PIF in the film's staple-you-to-your-seat opening scene (it's great, it really is). From here he traces the phenomenon back from one person to another until he finds himself in the armpit of Las Vegas where it all began. Chandler's investigation, again, is the only reason this film worked for me. It's told concurrently with Trevor's story as it unfolds. We see the far-reaching results of Trevor's idea even as Trevor believes he's had no impact at all.
This and the ending give the film a clear message: just help one person and you already made the world a better place. Sometimes it's hard to do but that's why you have to do it. Like your grandpa used to tell you, anything that's worth having is worth fighting for...or something like that. Which brings me to the ending. Let's just day it didn't affect me the way it was supposed to. It's one of those surprises you should have seen coming, one that's supposed to be fitting. That's just the problem, though--it doesn't fit at all. I can't get into it without giving it away so I won't.
"Pay It Forward" wants to leave you with the warm fuzzies but doesn't. No one could have done to change this. The acting, direction, writing, everything--everyone does their job well. There was no better way to do anything, not even the ending. This is just one of those cases of a project that must have looked great on paper but, upon completion, doesn't quite work.
Grade: C
Its characters, well portrayed by its dream cast (Kevin Spacey, Helen Hunt, Haley Joel Osment, Jay Mohr, Angie Dickinson, etc.), are so genuinely Real because (I guess) their lives suck so bad. For example, Arlene McKinney (Hunt) has two jobs and an alcoholic mother who ditched her as a kid, is an alcoholic in rehab herself and a former battered wife to top it off. It's good to put characters through a lot of challenges but this was ridiculous. No one's life is this terrible.
New teacher Eugene Simonet (Spacey) gives his students an impossible assignment: make the world a better place. Arlene's son, Trevor (Osment), sees no reason he can't do it. From his initial action, feeding and clothing a homeless drug-addict (Jim Caviezel), is formed an idea: Perform conditional random acts of kindness. The condition is that if someone does something for you, you must do something nice for three other people. Trevor calls it "pay it forward."
Reporter Chris Chandler (Mohr) stumbles upon PIF in the film's staple-you-to-your-seat opening scene (it's great, it really is). From here he traces the phenomenon back from one person to another until he finds himself in the armpit of Las Vegas where it all began. Chandler's investigation, again, is the only reason this film worked for me. It's told concurrently with Trevor's story as it unfolds. We see the far-reaching results of Trevor's idea even as Trevor believes he's had no impact at all.
This and the ending give the film a clear message: just help one person and you already made the world a better place. Sometimes it's hard to do but that's why you have to do it. Like your grandpa used to tell you, anything that's worth having is worth fighting for...or something like that. Which brings me to the ending. Let's just day it didn't affect me the way it was supposed to. It's one of those surprises you should have seen coming, one that's supposed to be fitting. That's just the problem, though--it doesn't fit at all. I can't get into it without giving it away so I won't.
"Pay It Forward" wants to leave you with the warm fuzzies but doesn't. No one could have done to change this. The acting, direction, writing, everything--everyone does their job well. There was no better way to do anything, not even the ending. This is just one of those cases of a project that must have looked great on paper but, upon completion, doesn't quite work.
Grade: C