Review - Imaginary Heroes

So instead of starting to read Specimen Days last night I got really lazy and watched Imaginary Heroes, the first film by Dan Harris, writer of X2 and the upcoming Superman film. The film stars Sigourney Weaver as the mother everyone would love to have and Emile Hirsch as the son lucky enough to have her.

The film is strong the first half, when the focus is more on the characters, but by the end there are so many plots thrown in I couldn't help but feel irritated, wishing Harris could've just chosen one or two of these stories to tell instead of heaping so much onto it that what you have are a series of scenes that only have to do with the one right before the last, wherein they bring up something totally new and unneeded to lead us to the next scene, and so on.

The film begins with Emile's brother commiting suicide. I could've watched and loved a movie that dealt with these actors in these characters dealing with that, and the first half mostly did just that. But suddenly Sigourney's maybe got cancer and Emile is the product of an affair she'd had and the best friend Emile had drugged-up sex with is suddenly his half-brother (a fact the film never even gets around to addressing)... it was just too much. And that all of this was supposed to happen in a year's time? This family has used up enough drama for ten years.

There are tons of great scenes though, and the acting is terrific. Being a child of the 80s Sigourney Weaver is a God to me, and here she's in fine form. It's the complete opposite of the suburban mother she played in The Ice Storm, and she can do no wrong, period. I like Emile Hirsch a lot, he does a really likeable fucked-up youth thing (The Girl Next Door is like totally underrated). Jeff Daniels and Michelle Williams also have very good moments, sprinkled amongst the neverending parade of needless plotting.

For a first film, though, it's strong; Harris just needs to get more relaxed, allow things to happen more naturally and not shoehorn unnecessary drama into an already interesting story. This isn't a superhero story, Dan, there's no need to ratchet up the tension constantly. That's what the actors are there for in these sorts of stories.

Oh and thanks for putting Kip Pardue in a speedo, by the way.
.