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Tuck Everlasting

Tuck Everlasting

List Price: $14.99
Your Price: $11.99
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Slow and depressing
Review: I saw this movie in sneak preview some time back & seeing the reviews its getting(that mostly seem to be more oriented to the book than the movie at that) felt maybe I should contribute my opnion. I feel somewhat bad for even giving it 2 stars but I guess there were a handful of moments that were tolerable.
In briefest summary this movie was bad. Quite possibly it ranks as one of the worst movies I've seen all year.
The book was hard for me to get through but the movie was infinitely worse - the first part is *slow* with unnessecary & genrally annoying voice-overs. The acting itself is mediocre at best - many of the lines sound fake and forced.
Even once the movie finally gets moving(though I find it debatable that it ever actually does) it proves painful. I suppose the story was supposed to teach us all something about living life but being that any given member of the Tuck family is more interesting and developed than Winnie I ended up mostly feeling disgusted about it's narrow view of things(How very lovely that the winey rich girl gets to choose her path in life) & wishing I'd left after the first 20mins of boredom.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Beautiful family tale about living life and understanding it
Review: Like the book, Tuck Everlasting proves odd fare for the audience it would generically be made for. Considering it was techincally made for 9-11 year olds, it's incredible, and applaudable, for a so called "generic Disney family film" to be so intelligent, thought provoking, and high quality. It's a real "family" film as opposed to the empty fare most movies of the same nature are. It can be slightly macabre, gently philosophical, and ponderous; it IS gentle, slow moving, and quiet, and believe it or not, it proves to be a somewhat mesmerizing, magical, other-worldly experience: lyrical and haunting folk strained music sifts through the scenery, in this case the magically captured springtime woodlands of Maryland where it was filmed, a believable and genuinely played young love romance, and the storybook-like narration from Elizabeth Shue provide an almost unbelievably pretty setting which we're immersed in.

...And it certainly isn't a bad thing. The rest of the film is much the same. A briefing to the plot of the book: The Tucks have immortality a la a hidden spring, Winnie Foster stumbles onto it, they kidnap her but ultimately teach her about the grim facts and joys life, and then a number of fast paced, short fuse adventures ensue, eventually leaving us with an ending that makes a lot of people cry. That's the book, and the movie is almost exactly the same. Some liberal changes, but the characters are there, completely.

Jay Russell, the director, must have been faced with an odd dilemma, turn what was already a heavy duty little fable into a tale that would please the enigma: the ever spoiled audience...and "Tuck" seems to float at it's own pace. It moves at an unusual speed for films these days, it just strolls along lovingly and thoughtfully, with some tense moments here and there, until the last 30 minutes or so, where everything falls into place with help from those exciting escapades. Then they use the last few shots of the film to induce one to tears in a way you wouldn't expect, by utilizing the hefty amount of previous movie where the characters, as they do in the storyline, merely "existed". It's smart, and it works, and the result is beautiful, if not bittersweet and heartbreaking.

Having said that, the film isn't staggeringly amazing in it's style or it's performances or it's script. Some of the camerawork didn't do anything for me, and the editing was a bit...off. The direction isn't anything Oscarworthy, but after all it's a family film, but not a generic one. Other than the absolutely stunning cinematography AND gorgeous, haunting score AND the great costumes AND production design (these last two aspects help the feel of the film greatly, in a film that relies on "feel" and that tangibility a great deal), the beauty of the film lies in it's sincerety and its simplicity, it's message and it's moral, and it's hefty handful of purely breathtaking and wonderful moments...and what I though was a truly beautiful ending.

Bledel (plays Winnie Foster) and Jackson (plays Jesse Tuck) have a chemistry, Jackson is truly capable at playing a wonderfully likeable and serious young fellow, and makes you want to run off with him and listen. Likewise Bledel does a great job with balancing a film on her shoulders, considering it's her film debut as opposed to her vastly different role and setting on "Gilmore Girls". As for the highly plugged "Oscar nominated cast", Kingsley is the standout with all the nuances you could possibly need and a performance that is downright creepy. Though Hurt and Spacek get very little screentime, they provide a familiarity and stability to the film, giving it a backbone so to speak. Just to see them in the background and to know they are there helps create a mood and atmosphere about their home and the Tucks' personalities . The rest of the cast, Garber, Irving, and Bairstow, are fairly capable, with Irving leading the pack.

This is a wonderful film. Quite brave considering all the flash and dash and raucousness of most films for the "teen/kid" age group these days. See it to bring your kids to a wholesome, mature-minded film that won't ruin YOUR ear drums, to get your mind off of everything else, to wax nostalgia, or gawk at pretty things and interesting ideas. It gives room to think and to daze in a bucolic setting with a wonderful passionate story about life.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Pleasantly Surprised
Review: This is the story of a rebellious girl named Winnie, faced with a very tough decision--does she want to live forever? She is faced with this choice after meeting with the Tucks, a family that unwittingly became immortal after a drink from a very special spring. It is also a story of greed, of people who would take advantage of this gift from the spring.

I was pleasantly surprised at how good the movie was--I read the book when I was younger, didn't like it at all, and was expecting not to like the movie either. However, I found it to be very entertaining and even left me with lingering questions after the movie was over (Would I want to live forever?, for example). I really enjoyed the musical score as well.

The acting was quite good, with performances by Sissy Spacek, William Hurt, and Alexis Bledel, among others.

Although it started off a bit slowly, the movie progressed quickly and became very interesting. Highly recommended!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A Wonderful Book
Review: Winnie (played by Alexis Bledel) is a curious young girl who meets a wonderful family who mysteriously never grow old and can't die. The trouble begins when a greedy man discovers the reason for this is because of some water they drank, and plans to market this to those naive enough to think living forever would be paradise. Winnie faces the dilemma of drinking the water and joining the family.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: An Everlasting Story.
Review: Tuck Everlasting is a great story for all ages because they are characters that you can really relate to. The film will be just as great, as long as you stay true to the book as much as possible. For example, you cannot change their names for your own satifaction. Nor can you change the setting of the story for that would completely take away from what the Tuck's personality. This is, undeniably, an everlasting story.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Tuck Everlasting
Review: This book caputered my imagination.It was a very good book. I think Winnie did the right thing by not drinking the water. It was a cool book. It would not be fun living forever. I like because it's a mystery and fantasy. If i could take one book on a long trip Tuck Everlasting would be that book. It was a adventures book. I would recommend this book to everyone.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Alexis Bledel-Tuck Everlasting
Review: This movie is great!!!! Alexis Bledel is my favorite actress in the world! Not only did she get Best Actress in a Comedy series, she was a model and was in this great movie! I was really happy to see her acting in this film, it waqs amazing.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Tuck Everlasting
Review: Tuck Everlasting sure is everlasting.The movie isn't completely terrible.It really explores life and death but it takes to long.The whole time I kind of felt bored.The plot is good but I don't think it or the book it was adapted from are all that great.Maybe this just isn't my kind of film but it just took forever to get to the climax and it was only 90 minutes.The acting definetly isn't Oscar winning; the only great performance was by Sissy Spacek.The dialogue is of course compatible to this kind of movie but I still didn't really like it.It was a little better than I thought it would be, though.If you are interested in living forever or dealing with death or your just a kid you may like it more than the rest of us out there.To add to everything else I didn't really like the time setting.Check this one out if you want to be bored.Young Winnie Foster, stifled by the formality of her proper life and domineering mother, escapes into the woods only to get lost.Soon she happens upon Jesse Tuck- a boy full of life and adventure who's unlike anyone she's ever met- and falls in love.The Tucks, a kind and genorous family, have a powerful secret- a spring that holds the magic of everlasting life.And now Winnie must choose to live life as she knows it or drink from the spring.

"Like the Tuck family themselves, this movie just goes on and on and on and on"
-- Larry Carroll, COUNTINGDOWN.COM

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Love this movie
Review: I love this movie! it is a great film...maybe better then the book. i cried for hours after i watched this movie (which is a good thing) if you like sad movies you'll love this!!!

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Great!
Review: TUCK EVERLASTING is simply a 'feel good' movie. Old fashioned in the best sense of the term, life-affirming, sentimental, finding the borders of credibility and celebrating them, and directed and acted with the sense of commitment that Jay Russell and his fine cast provided - put all of that together and it is close to impossible not to love this little movie.

Natalie Babbitt's 1981 novel may have been meant for the young readers, but in the translation to the screen this story appeals to the young at heart: chronological age is not applicable. The Tuck family happened upon a spring in a woods in the past, drank from the spring and voila! - the fountain of Ponce de Leon's obsession has been discovered. This dear family (mother Sissy Spacek, father William Hurt, and sons Jesse (Jonathan Jackson) and Miles (Scott Bairstow) settles into the fortunes and inevitable sadnesses that accompany becoming immortal: life's ebb and flow and the cycle of birth to death eludes them. Man's quest for eternal youth has its sad aspects.

Into the Tuck family secret woods happens Winnie (Alexis Bleidel), daughter of a wealthly family (mother Amy Irving and father Victor Garber), and encounters Jesse, slowly falls in love and learns the Tuck secret. Meanwhile an evil yellow-coated man (Ben Kingsley) finds the fount of his own obsession, informs Winnie's family that she has been kidnapped by the Tuck family, and the only way to regain Winnie is to sell their woods (and of course its invaluable spring) to him. How this all plays out - the inevitable capture of the Tucks and the way they resolve their immortal inaccessibility with Jesse's and Winnie's new found need for each other - serves as the ending and it is resolved well.

The settings and acting and physical beauty of this film are matched by the understated but important moments of philosophy about what is the meaning of the cycle of life as we know it rather than as we think we would reshape it. Some may label this film as corny or 'Hallmarky' and that is sad: there is plenty of room in the celluloid world for fragments of sincere tenderness such as this. Grady Harp, February 2005


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