Here (2024) TriStar/Drama RT: 104 minutes Rated PG-13 (thematic material, some suggestive material, brief strong language) Director: Robert Zemeckis Screenplay: Eric Roth and Robert Zemeckis Music: Alan Silvestri Cinematography: Don Burgess Release date: November 1, 2024 (US) Cast: Tom Hanks, Robin Wright, Paul Bettany, Kelly Reilly, Michelle Dockery, Gwilym Lee, Ophelia Lovibond, David Fynn, Zsa Zsa Zemeckis, Nicholas Pinnock, Nikki Amuka-Bird, Cache Vanderpuye, Anya Marco Harris, Joel Oulette, Dannie McCallum, Daniel Betts, Tony Way, Jemima Rooper, Delilah O’Riordan, Lilly Aspell.
Rating: ** ½
Robert Zemeckis has always been something of an innovator. He’s not afraid to try new things with his films. He seamlessly blended live actors and animated characters in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. He inserted Tom Hanks into actual historical footage in Forrest Gump. He used motion-capture animation in bringing The Polar Express to big screen life. The man is typically on the cutting edge of filmmaking techniques.
In his latest work Here, he does something I’ve never seen before, at least not that I can recall. He plants the camera in one place and keeps it there. Through the lens, we see history unfold on that very spot starting with the dinosaurs and straight through to present day. The camera never moves. We see everything from the same angle. Zemeckis utilizes frames-within-the-frame as a means of scene transition. It’s an interesting albeit not wholly successful concept. To his credit, it is original.
There are multiple plotlines in Here, but the main focus of the movie is the Young family. They lived in the house built on that spot of land for decades beginning when WWII vet Al (Bettany, The Da Vinci Code) bought it after coming home from the war. He lives there with his wife Rose (Reilly, Yellowstone) and their three children. The oldest Richard (Hanks, Forrest Gump) marries his pregnant girlfriend Margaret (Wright, Forrest Gump) there. They raise their daughter in that house while he works at an insurance company to save for a place of their own. They eventually take over the house after his parents move to a condo in Florida.
Told in non-linear fashion, Here jumps all over the place in time. It turns out the property used to belong to William Franklin (Betts, Allied), the illegitimate son of Benjamin Franklin. Before that, it was home to a young Native American couple. Once the house is built, it goes through a few inhabitants like amateur aviator John Harter (Lee, Bohemian Rhapsody) and his worrisome wife Pauline (Dockery, Downton Abbey). They’re followed by amorous couple Leo (Fynn, Undateable) and Stella (Lovibond, Rocketman). He invents what came to be known as the La-Z-Boy recliner. When they move out, the Youngs move in.
I wasn’t exactly bursting at the seams for Here. Zemeckis hasn’t had a good run of it lately with duds like Welcome to Marwen and the awful live-action Pinocchio. I didn’t see his remake of The Witches. I had every reason to believe Here would be another failure. The good news is it’s not a complete failure. It’s interesting, but it’s definitely flawed. The jumping around in time interferes with the dramatic momentum. Zemeckis never stays with one story long enough for viewers to get too emotionally invested. It’s a big problem, but it’s not the film’s biggest one.
Let me start by saying Forrest Gump co-stars Hanks and Wright are fine in Here. They do their best despite being hampered by some really creepy de-aging CGI. They’re made to look much younger than they actually are. They’re supposed to be 18 when we first see them. It doesn’t look right at all. Look at their faces, their expressions in particular. It’s weird and distracting. You start paying more attention to the wonky FX than whatever situation they’re in. It doesn’t look any better when their characters age through the years. The bad CGI extends to other aspects of the film, especially the bird that shows up in a few scenes. It serves the same purpose as the feather in Gump.
What I haven’t yet mentioned is the family that moves into the house after the Youngs move out. It’s a black family. This is where Zemeckis puts the woke into Here. We get a scene of the father telling his teenage son exactly what to do if he’s ever stopped by the cops. He also uses it as a gateway to introduce COVID. I get it, COVID and Black Lives Matter are both part of recent history. I’m just wondering what it adds to the story. Either way, it’s a clumsy addition that feels shoehorned in.
Here could have turned out worse than it did. It also could have been better. It’s definitely corny with some of the dopey dialogue. At one point, somebody actually says, “The future is where we’re going.” It sounded more convincing coming from the psychic Criswell in Plan 9 from Outer Space. The song choices aren’t much better. I knew it was only a matter of time until “Our House” played on the soundtrack. That’s not too obvious, is it? I did a fair amount of eye-rolling.
I don’t hate Here, but I can’t quite recommend it, at least not whole-heartedly. It’s an interesting experiment in filmmaking, but it doesn’t completely cut it as a film. It’s a little better than okay, but it’s still not worth the price of admission.
