Director Report Card: David Fincher (2008)

8. The Curious Case of Benjamin Buttons

In 1986, producer Ray Stark bought the film rights to the F. Scott Fitzgerald short story, “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” Frank Oz was chosen to direct, with Martin Short as the designated star. Over the course of the next twenty years, different directors and leading men would be attached to the project: Spielberg and Tom Cruise, Ron Howard and John Travolta. Spike Jonze came close to filming the story, with Charlie Kaufman even doing a draft of the script. When Gary Ross exited the project in 2004, David Fincher would enter, with Brad Pitt quickly jumping on-board. This would be the combo that would finally get the movie made. “The Curious Case of Benjamin Buttons” remains one of the most hotly debated films in Fincher's career.

As Hurricane Katrina draws closer to New Orleans, Caroline sits in the hospital with her elderly and ailing mother, Daisy. She asks her to read from the journal of a man named Benjamin Button. On the day World War I ended, Benjamin was born as an old man. Abandoned by his father and raised by the black owners of a nursing home, Benjamin – seven-year-old but with an elderly, decrepit body – meets and falls in love with Daisy, the granddaughter of a patient. As he grows up, he becomes younger, seemingly aging in reverse. He finds work as a tugboat sailor, sees the world, fights in World War II, finds love and looses it, and crosses path with Daisy again. As Caroline continues to read, she realizes a secret about her own past.

“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is the warmest film David Fincher has ever made. In a career defined by dark conspiracy and serial killer thrillers, here's a movie about the enduring power of love and how much value one person's life can have. This is probably why a lot of fans of the director have dismissed this as his most naked example of Oscar bait. The unforeseen sentimental side of the filmmaker is also apparent in “The Curious Case's” visual palette. Gone are the sickly greens and slick shadows we associates with the Fincher style. In their place are glowing amber colorations, earthy and cordial and nostalgic.

Like any story that attempts to look back at the impact of an entire life, “Benjamin Button” has an at-times episodic quality. We see anecdotes from Benjamin's unusual life. Such as the first time he walked, on his arthritic legs, at a Baptist revival before the preacher dropped over dead. Or the black man, who used to work in a zoo as a living display, that he befriends in his youth. The film wanders from Button's various adventures, to the colorful characters and situations he found himself in. Such as the alcoholic tugboat captain, his body covered in tattoos, or the eccentric woman he begins an affair with in France. The tagline for “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is “Life is not made up of minutes but of moments,” which seems to illustrate the film's philosophies. That, when you look back at it, the people you've known and adventures you've had are what you truly remember.

During his love affair with Elizabeth Abbott in Paris, she tells him about a time she attempted to swim the English channel. How she gave up half-way through and turned back, something she still regrets. Later in the film, once Benjamin has aged into the prime of his wife, he catches sight of a television report, of Elizabeth successfully completing a swim of the channel. This seems to illustrate another theme in the movie: That it's never too late to start. Or, in Benjamin's taste, too early. He begins his life with all the infirmity of old age but still moves forward, still seeks out his own life. From the beginning, he's told that he's near death, lucky to be alive, that he won't have much longer to live. Yet he keeps going, keeps striving, keeps defining himself. 

My favorite parts of “Benjamin Button” are the moments that are more like digressions. The film begins with a fable, of a blind clock-maker who looses his son in the first World War and builds a grand clock that runs backwards. This wistful, fantastic moment is brought to life with sepia tones and gentle visual effects. One of the men who live at the nursing home repeatedly mentions that he was struck by lightning seven times, which Fincher depicts as a series of silent movie-style inserts. The best such digression in the film is when Button illustrates how small events can have a big effect on a person's life. A domino effect of small incidents, little accidents, all lead up to Daisy suffering a devastating blow. It's a beautifully assembled, funny but also deeply sad depiction of how chance and fate all have their ways with us.

Considering its long development history, one assumes that the attachment of a mega-star like Brad Pitt is what finally got “Benjamin Button” made. Pitt's easy-going movie star charm is well-utilized in the titular role. Even after all he's seen overseas, Benjamin still maintains a child-like sense of wonder at the world. Pitt is excellent at summoning this sense of fresh-faced innocence. Cate Blanchett, naturally one of our greatest working actors, is also excellent as Daisy. Even when hassled with a not-entirely-convincing Southern accent, Blanchett projects charm and complexity, beauty and grace. 

Yet one does have to ask the question: Would the love story at the center of “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” be as charming if it starred less compelling actors? What Daisy and Benjamin see in each other is never quite elaborated upon. The two charm each other as children and seemingly carry that torch their entire lives. When they are both teenagers, and Daisy asks to make love, Benjamin insists they wait. Which is wholesome and shows he respects her. Beyond the relaxed chemistry the two actors share, this is the only real attraction we see between the characters. The greatness of their love, of their devotion to each other, is sometimes more informed than actually depicted.

Despite this central flaw, “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” still works for me. Part of that is because I found the framing device quite profound. Daisy, at the end of her life, asking her daughter to read from the journal sets up an easy-to-guess twist. There's still something captivating about the idea, of a mother revealing a secret history to her daughter on her death bed. That these events are happening right before Katrina blows into New Orleans, with nurses and weatherman in the background talking about how the hurricane may or may not miss the state, adds a quiet tension. The movie ends with the clock mentioned in the opening fable being destroyed in the hurricane, bringing the story full circles in a poetic way that can't help but appeal to me.

Some of the negative reviews of the film revolve around the script not doing more with the central gimmick. Would the story have been affected all that much if Benjamin had aged like a normal person, at least once he's out of his childhood? You can debate that but an interesting parallel emerges near the end. As Benjamin ages backwards into his youth, becoming a teenager and then a child, he starts to loose his memory and act erratically. He's developing dementia but is also acting more and more like a little kid. Basically, there's not that much of a difference between old age and early youth after all. Babies and the elderly are both frail and defenseless. Children and people loosing their memories see the world differently from the rest of us. It's an interesting idea.

Much of the press at the time of “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button's” release revolved around its visual effects. In the early scenes, where Benjamin is an old man/young child, Pitt's heavily made-up face was digitally pasted over a smaller actors body. The effect is not quite as seamless as the filmmakers' hoped, I imagine. The CGI baby Ben that appears early looks especially phony. Yet the illusion still works pretty well, mostly thanks to the practical make-up effects. These do a good job of making Brad Pitt look like an old man living at the turn-of-the-century. The make-up team would win an Oscar for their efforts. 

Fincher fills the film's supporting cast with familiar faces, as well as some performers who were on the verge of becoming bigger stars themselves. (As in “Zodiac.”) Taraji P. Henson and Mahershala Ali appear as Benjamin's adoptive parents, both of them bringing all their charm to the role of affectionate and compassionate people. Also watch out for a tiny Elle Fanning as the youngest version of Daisy. Otherwise, Fincher relies upon reliable character actors for many parts. Elias Koteas is memorably grave as the blind man in the opening. Jared Harris is amusingly colorful as the boozy tugboat captain. Tilda Swinton is lovably eccentric as Elizabeth, uniquely gorgeous and enchanting while believably flighty too.

I guess how much you enjoy “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” depends entirely on how sentimental you are. I, for one, am an ol' softie at heart. It's closing minutes, in which Benjamin's narration sums up everything he's learned over his life, admittedly made me a bit misty-eyed. I guess it's not surprising that most David Fincher fans, probably leaning on the more cynical side of things, wonder what the director saw in this story. Critics were a bit split on the movie, many loving it but a few vocal decenters voicing their displeasure. It's not a perfect film. It's too long and perhaps a little too whimsical for its own good. Yet, like everything the director touches, it's magnificently put together, beautifully photographed, and nicely acted. If this is what Fincher's stab at Oscar bait looks like, I say that's still pretty good. [Grade: B+]