Film Review: Here

Here
Director: Robert Zemeckis
Miramax, Image Movers
In Theaters: 11.01

For much on the 21st century, Robert Zemeckis, the Oscar-winning director of Forrest Gump, who also gave up Back to the Future and Who Framed Roger Rabbit? has been something of an experimental filmmaker, particularly in experimenting with new technologies. In the case of his latest film, Here, the experimentation extends far beyond playing around with motion capture.

Inspired by the acclaimed graphic novel by Richard McGuire, Here follows multiple families across generations who lived in the same spot in Pennsylvania, with the camera locked in a single frame as the story moves from one time to another, capturing the memories and experiences of the people who called this their home. The story begins in prehistoric times, with snapshots of the house’s location through different eras, from ancient Indigenous peoples to the family of Benjamin Franklin. By the early 20th century, John Harter (Gwilym Lee, Bohemian Rhapsody) and his wife, Pauline (Michelle Dockery, Downton Abbey, The Gentlemen) move in, establishing the house’s earliest modern history. Their lives are marked by John’s daring passion for flight, which worries Pauline. In the 1940s, the home is purchased by World War II veteran Al Young (Paul Bettany, A Beautiful Mind, WandaVision), who returns haunted by his past. His wife Rose (Kelly Reilly, Sherlock Holmes, Yellowstone) becomes a quiet yet stabilizing force for their family, including their son, Richard (Tom Hanks), who grows up to fall in love with a girl from his high school named Margaret (Robin Wright), and marries her when she gets pregnant. Their lives intertwine with the house, building an extended family as they navigate young marriage, parenthood and financial strain. Through their story—and glimpses of other families—the film captures the house’s collective memories, echoing the lives of those who have come and gone.

Conceptually, Here plays a lot like a visually ambitious student film padded out to feature length, and that padding can be very near deadly at time. When focused on the story of Richard and Margaret, I felt invested in the characters and the highs and lows of their relationship. I also enjoyed the cutaways to the Native Americans who inhabited the lands; some of those sequences are quite striking. The sequences following John and Pauline Harter never even registered for me, every cutaway to David Fynn and Ophelia Lovibond (Guardians of the Galaxy) as Leo and Stella, respectively, the inventors of the La-Z-Boy recliner, are just short enough of excruciating to get through and the whole Benjamin Franklin thing gets quite tedious. There’s a certain similarity between Here and We Live In Time, inasmuch as both tell fragmented stories about relationships in a non-linear structure, but the latter had the advantage of being able to move from place to place rather than being confined to one spot, and was firmly focused on two characters that you really cared about. The fact that the house/spot of land is, if not quite the main character, at least the connecting tissue between all of the characters and stories, means that it’s filled with “Wow, I can’t believe we’ve lived here (insert number of years)” expository dialogue, and the almost total lack of successful comic relief is a problem.  There are some moments that are quite inventive visually, though frequent use of comic book panel-style frames within a film rarely, if ever, works. The biggest strength of the film is Zemeckis’ unabashedly sentimental heart, and there will be as many people who hate that as love it. As a longtime fan who will always hold Forrest Gump in my heart, the best moments of emotion felt genuine enough to me to play as a plus.

Hanks and Wright, reteamed for the first time in 30 years, are terrific, and they anchor the movie even when little else can do so. While Richard and Margaret are not going to join Forrest and Jenny in the pantheon of beloved film characters, they are likable and relatable people, though the nature of the movie does keep us at a certain distance from them, even when they are standing near the camera. Bettany’s portrayal of Al is derailed by a phony American accent that sounds like impressions of Don Knotts, James Stewart, Robert De Niro and Bill Cosby chopped into fourths. The chemistry between Bettany and Hanks hits its stride in the last section of the film and partially salvages the performance. Nikki Amuka-Bird (The Outfit, Rumours) and Nicholas Pinnock (The Book of Clarence) do capable work as Helen and Devon Harris, the couple who owns the home after Richard and Margaret, but they are only given one particularly interesting moment.

I can’t go so far as to call Here a bad film, because it most certainly does have its merits, but I would classify it as an ambitious cinematic experiment that just doesn’t work, despite the best efforts of a highly talented director and his lead actors. I’d give it a moderate recommendation for die hard Zemeckis fans—and I count myself among them—but for me, as a story, Here simply didn’t go anywhere. –Patrick Gibbs

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