Collateral Beauty

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So, I watched this movie in early 2017, and I've wanted to do a review for it, but just couldn't bring myself to do so until now. This movie is hands down one of the most soulless, cynical, mean-spirited movies I've ever seen. What's more is it tries passing itself off as something you're supposed to find uplifting.The trailers passed it off as a movie that was about a man who had given up on life and was visited by the physical embodiments of death, love, and time (whom he had been writing letters to), while his closest friends are trying to help him and reach out to him. Instead the movie is about a man who has given up on life after losing his child and begins writing letters to death, love, and time. He has become a recluse, and his company is going under. His friends and colleagues hire actors to play the physical embodiments of these abstract entities in an attempt to make him look like he's crazy and take the company away from him. When I first heard that that was the actual plot of the movie, I thought it sounded so insane I had to see it. By the time the movie was over, I felt little else other than contempt for humanity because we allowed a piece of shit life this to exist. This is a movie that asks you to root for the most unlikable, despicable characters. It doesn't do it in a David Fincher, Martin Scorsese kind of way either. At least something like Fight Club knows Tyler Durden is a horrible character. This movie doesn't know its characters are the biggest assholes you'll ever meet. It genuinely thinks they are good, relatable people. There's a scene in this movie that tells you everything you need to know about them. The three friends (Edward Norton, Michael Pena, and Kate Winslet) are discussing this plan. Kate Winslet reminds her friends that their friend, coworker, and boss (played by Will Smith) lost his child. Norton's character chimes in with something along the lines of: "That was a year ago. He really needs to get over it." Here's why I have such a problem with this scene of the movie. As far as these characters go, Kate Winslet is the only one of the three who never married or had children. So, even if his own daughter is still alive, why the fuck would a fucking father say something like that!? The only character I found even remotely likable or relatable was Will Smith. When he really gets the chance to shine as a dramatic actor, the man can really pull it off, and he was the best part of this movie hands down because I genuinely bought into his emotions. Everything around him just made me mad.

1 / 10