Saturday, January 3, 2009

Seven Pounds

The newest movie starring Will Smith got savaged among reviewers. I saw it recently, and I think the ultra-harsh reviews were a bit unfair. The movie is about a man named Ben who seems to be stalking and examining an odd array of people. He also seems very troubled. What's going on? It's impossible to talk about the specifics of the movie without spoiling it, so I'll do that below the picture. But just about anyone paying close attention to the movie can figure out in broad strokes what's going on in the first 15 minutes. But this is one thing I actually liked about the movie. It was a puzzle of sorts. You're given fragments, pieces of something broken, and you need to piece them together to make sense of what you're seeing. I think movies like that are interesting, if done well, and I think Seven Pounds is done reasonably well.

[SPOILERS BELOW]








So what's the big mystery? Ben is not Ben, but actually Tim. He's using his brother's credentials as an IRS agent to investigate people, specifically people who need organ or tissue transplants. Tim used to be a big-shot aerospace engineer with a beautiful fiance. But one night he was driving his car along a windy road, checking his Blackberry, and he caused a wreck which killed seven people, including his fiance.

So he decides to help seven other people. But he wants to make sure they're good people, hence the stalking. He donates part of his liver to a social worker. He donates bone marrow to a dying boy. He gives a kidney to a man and his house to an abused woman and her children. But he's apparently so stricken with guilt that his final acts of charity involve killing himself. His final donations are his eyes to a blind man and his heart to a woman named Emily who has congenital heart disease.

There's a wrinkle with this last one, since while investigating Emily, he falls in love with her. But her condition worsens and when the doctor tells him that she has about a 3% chance to find a donor, he does the math and kills himself to give her his heart.

All the actors are good, and the direction is competent, and I actually found the situation poignant. I would have liked a scene between Tim and his friend or a psychiatrist or someone trying to talk him out of it, just to see more of what was going through his head and his rationale, but that might have actually made the film worse. I could actually believe that someone who had killed seven people through recklessness would try to atone for it this way. The only really absurd part that pulled me out of the movie was the way in which he killed himself.

By jellyfish. Yes, that's right...he got a jellyfish into his motel room, filled his bathtub with ice, and went swimming with a jellyfish. He even put down a laminated sign near the tub that read "DO NOT TOUCH THE JELLYFISH" for the paramedics. I think the writers thought that this was a poetic way to commit suicide. There's an early scene where Tim as a boy is taken to the zoo by his father, and we see the ethereal movement of the jellyfish in their tank. So I'm pretty sure I know what the creators were going for, but unfortunately it didn't really work, and as a result was the silliest part of the movie. I think the suicide by jellyfish is what earned it such scorn (28% on Rotten Tomatoes as of this writing). Which is a shame, because it really is an interesting, well-made, if emotionally-manipulative movie. It could even have been a powerful movie if Tim had actually researched a way to kill himself that would preserve his organs that didn't involve a friggin' jellyfish.

One last note: I was reminded of the philosophical conundrum of sacrificing a single person to save some number of strangers. It usually goes something like this: Is is ethical to kidnap and kill a healthy person in order to use their organs to save seven healthy people? In studies, people usually find such scenarios highly unethical, though in forced choice situations (e.g., a madman puts you in a room with two buttons, one of which kills a single person, the other kills seven, and if you don't press either, they all die) it is usually deemed ethical to kill one person rather than seven. The organ transplant scenario is not normally seen as a forced choice (even if we could reliably predict that all seven people will be dead within a month). Anyway, Seven Pounds has the capacity to lead to some interesting discussions of philosophy and morality, despite the silly business with the jellyfish.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

The charcater "Tim" will smith caculated very carefully in which way to die to give the best chance for all organs to be useable. I think it was a very thought out plan not silly in the least.

Anonymous said...

I also thought the part with the jellyfish was very creative and intriguing. Have you ever seen anything like that before? It was a beautiful thing that he did for those people, and the jellyfish scene was very intriguing as well, I think. It was all very moving.

Anonymous said...

So how long did it take paramedics to figure out how to remove the jellyfish without getting stung? And where did he do this research to know the jellyfish was not a problem for any organs. And how did he know it would really kill him not just put him in agony.

Unknown said...

Actually, i love the ending with jelly fish and it is easy to explain everything why he did like that, and not in a different way. Everything was for a reason.
First, he used box jellyfish because it is the most dangerous animal in the whole world, it's venom is deadly to everyone. People usually die of heart failure, or drown of shock.
Second, bathtub of ice was used to keep body temperature low after death that organs would be useful. And one more reason why it was icy water is that the jellyfish would die to because it lives only in warm water, like for example around Australia or so.
SO, as i said everything was for a reason. And if most of the critics are not smart enough to figure it out, that is ridiculous. I believe that this movie was really good and worth better rating that it got, i would say 9/10 would be good.
That's only my 2 cent's
Peace
:)

Anonymous said...

Just saw the movie on cable - it was ruined by the jelly fish, if writers are going to put that in, they need to explain how a body full of the deadliest toxin could give organs to someone and they wouldn't die. I understand it wasn't a true story but that was stupid. Unless it's sci fi or action, it needs to be in the realm of the possible.
Even if he had killed himself in a way that would leave the organs useable, I doubt the ethics board would allow a transplant to be done from someone killed theirself to donate their organs.

Anonymous said...

I also thought that the movie was very well done. Also, what is so stupid about him killing himself with a jellyfish? If we are stating opinions here, then I feel that is a harsh opinion. Movies are supposed to be about art and jellyfish are like living art. I felt the movie was very poetic, sad, and a bit disturbing, but I get it. Not to mention, it was incredibly original. So he did it in a motel room, so what. There are no rules to committing suicide. Either the person doing so wants to send a message or not. How can you judge suicide? It is not for us to judge. As far as I am concerned if you want to have negative feelings about the movie the most I would say is the same thing I thought when I first saw it 3 years ago. They should have maybe had a disclaimer on it. I suffer from depression and have frequent suicidal ideations. I do not need any more ideas. Besides that, I can still appreciate the movie for what it is I just cannot watch it ever again. Thus, for as powerful as I found the movie to be, I give it a 10/10.
One last thought…I do have to admit that I really didn’t think about jellyfish much before the movie. However, I am now fascinated by them mainly because I love their dynamic. I find them beautiful, mesmerizing and yet they are deadly. Amazing when you think of the fact that there are so many things in our world that share the same attributes.

Anonymous said...

I read that box jellyfish do live in cold waters as well

Unknown said...

Box jellyfish venom will kill you within 2 minutes hence why he called 911 before getting in the tub. He would be dead before they got there, and I believe he had a dnr already in place because of his friend. The research on box jellyfish didn't need to be shown. It wasn't silly it showed he had everything planned completely in order to save lives by sacrificing himself.

Unknown said...

Box jellyfish = better than a more easily reproduced suicide method due to concerns re: suicide contagion/"copycat" suicide

loegey said...

Jelly fish venom causes the heart to seize up! Not the thing to do if you are trying to donate it. It’s nit likely the heart would have been viable.

loegey said...

Yes it would have killed him because it’s common that the venom will cause human heart to seize up! Not really going to a good thing for the recipient now is it! Nit believable in the end.

loegey said...

The venom cause the heart to seize up and stop beating. Not so sure there is a way to start it again. Wouldn’t work.