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August Rush
Sensitive, imaginative direction and a solid cast helps the 2007 musical melodrama August Rush stay viable despite a meandering story that takes some implausible and ugly detours en route to a seemingly impossible conclusion that should put stupid smile on your face or wiping a tear from your eye...or both.
Lyla (Keri Russell) is a pregnant concert cellist who has a one night stand with a hyper rock guitarist named Louis (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) and are then separated by Lyla's controlling father (William Sadler) who spirits his daughter out of town and upon her giving birth, puts the baby up for adoption without her knowledge.
Eleven years later, we meet Evan Taylor (Freddie Highmore), a musical child prodigy who has one mission in life and one only: to find his birth parents and he is certain that his musical gifts are the way to do it. His entire existence has become about music. he is drawn to all kinds of music, but no matter the joy and excitement his gifts bring to others, his mission of finding his birth parents remains his #1 priority, but his mission is waylaid by a slick con man named Wizard Wallace (Robin Williams) who decides that Evan is a cash cow, changes his name to August Rush and plans to use the child as a way off the New York streets. August won't give up though because he believes his parents will "hear" him through his music.
James V. Hart and Nick Castle have crafted an emotionally manipulative story about a family that has been unjustly separated trying to find each other again, kept apart by one circumstance after another. The concept of August connecting with his parents through his music is a little hard to swallow but we really really want to because we love Evan/August from the moment we meet him and the circumstances through which he became separated from his mother also demand this family reunion. Loved the way once Lyla found out her baby was alive, she dropped everything and finding Evan became her only reason to live. The connection between Louis and August was often more affecting because they were unaware of their connection. I loved the scene at the beginning of the final act where Louis and August connect in Washington Square Park and are both very confused by it.
There isn't a lot of realism about the story presented...the idea of three musicians being reconnected through their music is pretty out there but director Kirsten Sheridan does lure us into this story with her imaginative directorial eye that allows our imaginations to consider the possibility that what we're being asked to accept could actually happen.
Freddie Highmore gives another enchanting performance that rivals his work in Finding Netherland and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and gets solid support from an intense Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Robin Williams who effortlessly brings the smarmy as the Wizard. Terrance Howard is effective as a sympathetic social worker, as are Leon Thomas III as a young street musician, Alex O'Loughlin as Louis' brother, and Broadway legend Marian Seldes as the Dean of Julliard. The pacing of the story is a little too leisurely, but the patience is absolutely rewarded.
Sensitive, imaginative direction and a solid cast helps the 2007 musical melodrama August Rush stay viable despite a meandering story that takes some implausible and ugly detours en route to a seemingly impossible conclusion that should put stupid smile on your face or wiping a tear from your eye...or both.
Lyla (Keri Russell) is a pregnant concert cellist who has a one night stand with a hyper rock guitarist named Louis (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) and are then separated by Lyla's controlling father (William Sadler) who spirits his daughter out of town and upon her giving birth, puts the baby up for adoption without her knowledge.
Eleven years later, we meet Evan Taylor (Freddie Highmore), a musical child prodigy who has one mission in life and one only: to find his birth parents and he is certain that his musical gifts are the way to do it. His entire existence has become about music. he is drawn to all kinds of music, but no matter the joy and excitement his gifts bring to others, his mission of finding his birth parents remains his #1 priority, but his mission is waylaid by a slick con man named Wizard Wallace (Robin Williams) who decides that Evan is a cash cow, changes his name to August Rush and plans to use the child as a way off the New York streets. August won't give up though because he believes his parents will "hear" him through his music.
James V. Hart and Nick Castle have crafted an emotionally manipulative story about a family that has been unjustly separated trying to find each other again, kept apart by one circumstance after another. The concept of August connecting with his parents through his music is a little hard to swallow but we really really want to because we love Evan/August from the moment we meet him and the circumstances through which he became separated from his mother also demand this family reunion. Loved the way once Lyla found out her baby was alive, she dropped everything and finding Evan became her only reason to live. The connection between Louis and August was often more affecting because they were unaware of their connection. I loved the scene at the beginning of the final act where Louis and August connect in Washington Square Park and are both very confused by it.
There isn't a lot of realism about the story presented...the idea of three musicians being reconnected through their music is pretty out there but director Kirsten Sheridan does lure us into this story with her imaginative directorial eye that allows our imaginations to consider the possibility that what we're being asked to accept could actually happen.
Freddie Highmore gives another enchanting performance that rivals his work in Finding Netherland and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and gets solid support from an intense Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Robin Williams who effortlessly brings the smarmy as the Wizard. Terrance Howard is effective as a sympathetic social worker, as are Leon Thomas III as a young street musician, Alex O'Loughlin as Louis' brother, and Broadway legend Marian Seldes as the Dean of Julliard. The pacing of the story is a little too leisurely, but the patience is absolutely rewarded.