Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

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Release Date: 17 February 2012

Directed by: Stephen Daldry

Starring: Tom Hanks, Sandra Bullock, John Goodman, Max Von Sydow, James Gandolfini, Viola Davis, Jeffrey Wright, Adrian Martinez, Thomas Horn, Zoe Caldwell

There's always one Oscar nominee whose inclusion is baffling. The Blind Side was one, this is another. But while the former was a ninety minute happy ending with zero drama, Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close does find the necessary drama to keep things ticking over. It’s the repetition that proves its undoing.
Eleven-year-old Oskar (Horn) and dad Thomas (Hanks) are genuine buddies, delighting in treasure hunts and solving little mysteries. When Thomas dies in the 9/11 attacks, a distraught Oskar discovers a key in an envelope hidden in a vase in his father's room. The envelope has 'Black' written on it. Thinking that his dad has left him one last message wrapped up in another mystery treasure hunt, Oskar takes to the streets of New York tracking down all the Blacks in the phone book while mum Linda (Bullock) worries at home. Grandmother Zoe Calwell and a mute Max Von Sydow, who is roped into helping Oskar on his quest, live across the way.
Adapted from Jonathan Safron Foer's (Everything Is Illuminated) novel, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is a deep and touching insight into loss and grief. Well, it's supposed to be but a lot of this must have been lost in the adaptation and what's left is a series of 'feel sad here' moments; director Stephen Daldry (Billy Elliot, The Reader) tries to be touching in every scene and it all gets a bit much. In the deluge of sentimentality there were always going to be moments that hit the mark however, and one would have a heart of stone to be unmoved by Hanks' last phone call to Bullock before the tower collapses, or Oskar's impassioned rant at his failure to find a logical reason in his father's death. Newcomer Horn, in this scene in particular, showcases what a talent he could be.
Oskar is an interesting character to carry a film. He's a damaged, socially awkward kid with no friends, hence his close ties with his father and the devastation he feels when he dies. Oskar has a condition that's somewhat close to Asperger's Syndrome; he's smart (a bedtime story would be a chapter from a Brief History Of Time) but he trusts too much in cold logic that doesn't leave a lot of room for human frailty - think Big Bang Theory's Sheldon without the canned laughter. Daldry effortlessly gets inside Oskar's head to show us how he sees the world: the streets are NOISY, subway trains are FAST, buildings are too TALL, park swings are DANGEROUS, etc.
Watching this kid walk around New York banging a tambourine (it's the only thing that makes him feel safe) for over two hours gets samey, however, and even though the introduction of Von Sydow helps shake things up, it falls back into repetition soon enough.

Review by Gavin Burke