Life of Pi

For some odd reason, my body decided at 3:30am this morning that it was time to wake up.  I fought it, but eventually I accepted my loss and got out of bed.  Pointless story short, I am rather tired.  Luckily for me, I had written this review the other day so I did not have to strain my sleep deprived brain too much today.  After having wanted to see Life of Pi since I saw the first trailer, I finally got around to seeing it thanks to its availability on Netflix.

Not being a fan of 3D I never find myself longing to have seen a film in that format.  However, when I saw Life of Pi on my television screen I got the real sense that I was missing out on a  major part of the experience.  Director Ang Lee seemed to have taken the visual aspects of movie making and used them as a story telling device, while in most films they just make up the backdrop.  I feel like I missed out on the true emotions of this film by only seeing it in the second dimension, but it was still a fantastic movie.

In the movie, Pi Patel is meeting with a writer to talk about an amazing story of his youth, and it is this older version of Pi who at times adds some narration to the story.  He talks of his youth, where his name came from (he went by Pi because his first named sounded like 'pissing,' and that got him some ridicule), and the history of his family.  Pi was a young child who seemed to embrace all things, such as all different religions, and was challenged by his father to use logic to choose only one thing instead of accepting everything.  Pi's father owned a zoo, where there were many animals including a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker.  It is with this tiger that Pi perhaps his first real encounter with his father's world of reason as Pi was caught wanting a close look at the tiger, and his father shows his son the graphic nature of the animal's instincts.  He warns Pi that what Pi sees in the eyes of the tiger are not those of a soul, but only Pi's emotions being reflected back at him.

When Pi is a teenager, it is decided by his father that the family will be moving to Canada and that the zoo animals will make the sea voyage with them and then will be sold.  While at sea, the ship encounters a massive storm and sinks, with Pi making it on to a life boat where he soon finds that he shares the small vessel with a wounded zebra, an orangutan, a hyena, and Richard Parker.  Before too long, the hyena kills the zebra and the orangutan and then it eventually gets killed by the tiger, leaving Pi alone at sea with Richard Parker.

The reason why I went into the detail that I did in the synopsis of this movie is because the film itself is about story telling, and the relativity of it.  While this story seems rather fanciful (especially when Pi tells tale of an island he comes across) it fits with the mind of the young boy who was open to everything and embraced all things in life.  Whether or not Pi's story is indeed what happened to him, Richard Parker's role is crucial, as the boy is forced to overcome his fears and eventually look the tiger right in the eyes.

This fanciful tale is pushed along by both the wonderful screenplay by David Magee (who received an Oscar nomination for his work) and the acting clinic put on by newcomer actor Suraj Sharma, who played the teenage version of Pi.  We witness Pi go through the full range of emotions, and there was never one moment where I did not believe what I was seeing from Sharma.  A movie that has limited locations and limited cast puts all of the weight on the star, and Sharma pulled if off with expertise and charm.  I should also note that Irrfan Khan portrayed the adult Pi in a very captivating way, as he was essentially the story teller that we were sitting at the feet of.  He had a soft charisma that made it very easy to hang off of every word he spoke.

Visually, this was a true masterpiece.  It showed that special effects, if integrated properly, can be a key component to the story being told.  We get a sense of the vastness of the ocean, the fantasy of the locations and events, and a true sense of danger from Richard Parker.  I was quite amazed at how many different emotions that I felt through the movie were attached to that tiger, and that is a huge credit to the visuals.

A good movie entertains, and a great movie gets us talking.  This movie got me talking.  It got me talking about what I saw, what I thought the themes were, and the symbolism used in the film.  Not only did it leave me talking about it, it left me thinking about it as well, mulling over the character of young Pi and how it influenced his journey at sea.  Thinking long and hard about it, I cannot come up with much to complain about with this film.  It was a touching story with depth to it, and a thought provoking comment on our own mental constructs through adversity, and the relativity of the story teller's perspective.

Rating - 4 out of 4 stars