zee If the point of any narrative work of art is to make me sympathize with the human problems of a character, this movie is a failure . The story is of a child who killed his brother accidentally, and there is plenty to sympathize with there, it may seem. A family torn apart, a tragedy that goes unnamed, the guilt and loneliness, etc.But this tragedy is here played almost for laughs with a bizarre fabulist kind of treatment, and so I never believe in any of it, and I'm left not giving a crap that some kid has died, because I can't believe that the kid is real. Nor is anything real. I leave thinking either I'm a terrible person for not caring that a kid has died... Or I choose a more comfortable feeling and that is to think that the director /writer /everyone involved in this is a soulless or cruel idiot. Yes, it is only a movie, but books and movies are supposed to make me believe for their duration and to illuminate the human experience. This does none of that. It felt like an insult to me and a masturbatory exercise by the filmmaker, whose work I will avoid henceforth.

Reno Rangan The film was produced by three countries from three different continents, carved by one of my favoutire French directors that talks of a prodigy child. An English language film set in the American soil. If you had liked his films, then you would like this one as well. Like all his films, it was visually fantastic and it was his first digital 3D project. One of the underrated film of the recent time. A road adventure and a coming-of-age film that neatly rendered especially for the family and children film fans.More like it was a kid version of 'Amelie' and now I realise why the author picked this particular foreign filmmaker for the cinematic translation. This is not some kid's summer vacation tale or the school related stuff, but a rural kid and his weird family. They're united by family, but divided by their field of interest. Born in such family, the film focused his life and mostly the fighting of his loneliness.It was based on the book about a 12 year old boy T.S. Spivet who lives on a ranch in the Rockies with his family. He's a scientific research enthusiastic and so one day he receives an unusual call from the Washington DC that he had won a prestigious award for his invention. After a sudden tragedy in the house he set to travel by his own to the other side of the country. The adventure begins as he hitchhike to his destination where he learns many things."The amazing thing about water drops, is that they always take the path of least resistance. For humans, it's exactly the opposite."The kid was brilliant, it was his perspective story. In one of the scenes when he gets hurt, that felt like it was real. His co-stars supported him all the way, but not as a game changer. You might agree with me that it is not a great story, somewhat familiar too, but the film topic is inspiring like how an atypical family cooperates during the bad times that compared with their negligence to each other at one point before. There are a few fun moments, but also gets emotional at the final part.The train journey had lots of effects on the narration, because I'd seen a road movie, but this is a very rare, especially it gives us some glimpse over awesome landscapes of different part of the country. Like I said, the cinematography was the best part of the film followed by many others. In the end, I was very satisfied for it is being somewhat simple with having an extraordinary boy character. Because, you know, genius boy means usually the writers goes for an extra mile to make him shine with his brain powers to perhaps face the bad guys or the bad situations for which the audience sets to go awe.Really very sad that it was not as popular as 'Hugo' where everyone who saw it comparing with, especially for the digital 3D visuals. That tells how much the people are addicted to Hollywood and of course marketing was not upto the standards as against the film's standard. In fact, it took me two years to learn such film is exist. So I definitely recommend it to all. If you have not seen it yet, just do it, you might like it, surely you would enjoy it.8/10

shominy-491-652355 We rent a lot of movies locally and we rented this movie with high hopes. We have enjoyed many movies with young children as the stars/co- stars (such as "Hugo," "Nim's Island," "What We Did on Our Holiday" and "Mr. Holmes"). Although we enjoyed Kyle Catlett's performance, before 30 minutes were passed, we stopped the movie, and returned it to the video store for a refund. We have spent our lives helping people and animals in peril. We are simply sick and tired of animals being depicted in movies in cruel or neglectful or abusive ways. People think "cowboys" are cool. Well, cowboys, like the father in this movie, was callous and cruel when one of their goats was in pain. We don't need to see idiot human characters with hearts of stone/no compassion and a room full of poor stuffed animal heads (very un-cool). What's cool is Chuck Connors in "The Rifleman" - a character who cared about humane treatment of people and animals.

bremennews What a surprise to me- I was expecting another European artsy movie that does not go anywhere. I am European and generally sick of this kind of movies especially from France that bore me to tears. Instead I saw an entertaining movie, full of wonderful filmmaking, touching story and interesting characters. The story is told with an incredible focus on details and beautiful imagery. This is definitely an emotional story carried by kid actors that could have gone terribly wrong. For my taste Mr. Jeunet found a very tasteful way to direct the cast through the potential pitfalls of the story. The story is out there in a fantasy world combined with National Geographic Imagery- great combination. I am sure not for everyone but it worked for me. Chapeau monsieur Jeunet.