Here (Christian Movie Review)
Its unique storytelling approach requires patience, but Here is a wildly inventive, profound meditation on the moments that make our brief lives meaningful.
About the Film
Much has been said about Hollywood’s creative rut. But every now and then, a film demonstrates true originality. Here, the latest offering from visionary director Robert Zemeckis, is one example. It is a boundary-pushing film unlike anything I have seen. As with most experimental creations, it will likely spark polarized responses. Its unique storytelling approach requires patience, but Here is a wildly inventive, profound meditation on the moments that make our brief lives meaningful.
The film’s primary intrigue is that it is shot entirely from a fixed, dioramic perspective. The story unfolds as a sweeping historical journey featuring a single plot of land and the people who populate it, from the extinction of the dinosaurs until the present day. Most of the story takes place within the living room of a house built on that land and portrays the various families who occupy it, utilizing de-aging technology to showcase the characters at different stages of their lives. The result is a movie that is paradoxically both staggeringly vast and exceedingly narrow in scope.
Whether the movie resonates with viewers will largely depend on if they find its unique storytelling approach to be provocative or frustrating. Here is not a movie you watch for the plot, at least not in the traditional sense. Instead, the film weaves together an ambitious tapestry that depicts a philosophical and emotional picture of life. It is more of a collection of moments and memories than a cohesive narrative. Audiences looking for a more traditional story may grow frustrated by the many detours that don’t impact the main characters in any immediate way.
But for audiences who buy into the film’s premise as a thematic exploration rather than a narrative one, the film offers a compelling look at life and what it means to be human. Watching Here captures the nostalgia of looking through an old photo album. In fact, the film evokes that photo album motif by effectively using the visual cue of picture-in-picture boxes (like the frames of Polaroid pictures) to transition between scenes or juxtapose different moments. The various narrative threads may be only loosely connected, but they fit together thematically. Times change, but people have experienced the same peaks and valleys of life since time began—the ecstasy of a newborn child, the lament over unrealized dreams, the fire of new love, and the sorrow of painful goodbyes.
The vast narrative gaps in the story sometimes make connecting to the characters challenging. The superhuman likability of Tom Hanks goes a long way, but the characters that populate the story are not always easy-to-root-for Hollywood heroes. Yet their imperfection is part of what makes them compelling. They are strikingly ordinary people, the type that are more likely to show up next door than on the silver screen.
For all its intriguing elements, the film doesn’t always pull its threads together seamlessly. The lack of camera movement makes the film feel like a theater play at times, and audiences may need time to adjust to its rhythm. The same is likely true for the de-aging of the actors. The technology has come a long way, but the sight of digitally de-aged characters still resides in the “uncanny valley” (though that is perhaps more due to the knowledge that Tom Hanks and Robin Wright are not teenagers than anything particularly off-putting about their appearance). The use of such technology remains highly controversial (and even morally debatable), but Here may represent its most justified use.
Here won’t resonate with all viewers. The same unconventional, inventive elements that make it fresh and provocative also make it frustrating and challenging. Even so, in a Hollywood landscape that too often elects to “play it safe,” it’s commendable when a filmmaker takes such a bold, creative swing. Here is a complicated experience. But life is too. This film reminds viewers that our years on this earth are soberingly small in the vast scheme of history, yet the moments we experience along the way make life meaningful.
For Consideration
Language: There is one F-word and frequent other profanities throughout. There is also a high volume of using the names “God” and “Jesus” in vain.
Violence: None.
Sexuality: A woman poses for photographs topless (although no nudity is depicted, as her breasts are covered with her arms or otherwise concealed from view). A nude painting is visible in one scene. A wife indicates her desire to have sex with her husband, leading him to drop his pants and stagger upstairs in his underwear. A couple begins to make love on a sofa, and in a later scene the moment is playfully recalled (“we were going hot and heavy…”). A teenage girl becomes pregnant by her teenage boyfriend. A man admits infidelity.
Engage The Film
Mortality and Memories
The author of Ecclesiastes wrote, “There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the sun” (3:1). Here is a movie about the natural, God-ordained rhythms of life. It is a visceral reminder that our own story may feel all-consuming, but we are merely one small blip in the vastness of history. Though our lives are unique, there is a shared humanity that connects us to our neighbor. In its final moments, the film finally breaks its stationary perspective, moving the camera to zoom out from the house. The scene shows many other rooftops, as if to challenge viewers that the people and families all around us are fellow pilgrims on the journey of life.
At one point, a character declares, “The future! It’s the only direction we can go.” The theme of mortality is ever present in Here. In one sense, it contributes to the film’s melancholic, almost nihilistic perspective on life (particularly because the film includes only the cursory presence of faith and religion). Our lives are brief. The homes in which we make memories today will ultimately be occupied by others, and we will all eventually be forgotten to history. Is there a purpose to life?
On the other hand, the movie’s exploration of mortality is also hopeful and inspiring. We only get one life. We must strive to live it well. At the end of the film, Tom Hank’s character remarks, “I have no regrets.” It’s a sentimental notion, but also a questionable one. In one sense, it is healthy to accept the parts of our story—both the good and the bad—that make us who we are. Even so, his life is also characterized by constant worry as he looks ahead to career breakthroughs that never come and dreams that are left unfulfilled.
Jesus said, “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble” (Matthew 6:34). In the end, what makes life meaningful (at least from an earthly perspective) is the journey, not merely the destination. The future may be the only direction we’re heading, but Here reminds us to live in the present.
