Water for Elephants Review
By Karen Dahlstrom
Carny Knowledge
Based on the novel by Sara Gruen, "Water for Elephants" is a period tale set in a traveling circus during height of the Depression. While pretty to look at, the film is a tepid, toothless melodrama — long on style, short on substance.
The protagonist (and narrator) is Jacob Jankowski (Robert Pattinson), a veterinary student who drops out of college after the death of his parents and finds work as a circus vet. The story is told in flashbacks as a 93-year old Jacob (beautifully played by Hal Holbrook) reminisces about his time with the Benzini Bros circus. From the first strains of James Newton Howard's cloying, cliche-ridden score, it's clear that we're about to be treated with some old-timey wisdom and sappy melodrama. And that's exactly what we get.
The Benzini Bros circus, though a fairly low-rent outfit, is run with a finely-tuned precision by the owner and ringmaster, August (Christoph Waltz). Jacob is immediately taken with the circus life and by the show's star (and August's wife), Marlena (Reese Witherspoon). In Jean Harlow platinum waves and bias-cut silks, Marlena seems like a dream amidst the gritty and sometimes violent world of the circus. She and Jacob form a friendship over their mutual love of the animals, and eventually a flirtation begins.
Or it would, if there was any chemistry between the film's leads. Though it's nice to see Pattinson with a bit more color in his cheeks and less glitter than he normally gets to wear as Edward Cullen in the "
Twilight" series, he gives a performance that's just as cold. His reactions are pretty much limited to smirking and looking confused. Witherspoon spends too much time honing her 30s movie goddess delivery than giving her character a soul. Though she tells of her hard life before meeting August, and her salvation afterward as she was made a star, we never see it in her eyes. Witherspoon's just playing dress-up, and Pattinson's just happy to be there.
Christoph Waltz, however, brings the same intensity to August as he did in his role as the Nazi commander in "
Inglourious Basterds". At once charming and menacing, he devours every scene he's in. His abandon when he sadistically abuses the animals, and his wife, gives the film a much-needed edge - though it seems out of place in the film's pleasant pablum.
In the book, Gruen takes great pains to explain the fascinating world of circus lore, and to address the relationships between humans and animals. Unfortunately, not enough of either subject has made its way into the film. Like the circus, the most interesting acts are the ones tucked away in the Midway. Occasionally, we're given tantalizing glimpses of the world of the roustabouts, side show acts and the carny life as Jacob makes friends around camp, but the most interesting characters are quickly shunted aside to make room for more moony looks between Jacob and Marlena.
Drawing the shortest straw is Rosie, the aged elephant at the heart of the book. Rosie's appearance — fairly late in the film, it seems — is used merely as a vehicle to help bring the star-crossed couple together. Interestingly, Pattinson lights far more sparks with his pachydermic co-star than with his human one — if anything, it should have been a sign to explore the more interesting aspects of the animals and the circus itself. They say elephants never forget, but "Water for Elephants" is one film that won't stay long in the memory.
