The Giver

As with other teenage dystopian books converted to movies, fans of The Giver (written by Lois Lowry) were worried about how Phillip Noyce's film adaptation of the same name would turn out. But hey, it has Meryl Streep and Jeff Bridges in it, so it can't be that bad right? Can it?

In 2048, after a damaging war, society has placed itself in a controlled environment, devoid of colours and emotions, and with the citizens' memories from before this new society erased, in an attempt to prevent history repeating itself. The Societies' Chief Elder (Meryl Streep) is assigning roles to young adults as they mature, but Jonas is not selected. However, as it turns out, Jonas has a special ability that has seen him assigned to the position of Receiver of Memory.

As Receiver of Memory, he will be the only one to hold the memories of the past and must use these to advise the elders. But first he must be trained by the current Receiver of Memory (Jeff Bridges). It is during this training process that he receives the truth about society.

I have never read the book, but the plot, whilst convoluted, was at least a change from some of the more generic tales of dystopic societies. However, it never quite evolves into anything that challenges its characters or proves particularly thought-provoking. For a movie about the removal of memories and manipulation of emotions, its attempt to illicit an emotional response from us through the flashback of memories, whilst cinematically stunning, feels a bit too superficial.

However, there were also some serious faults with the acting. Bridges and Streep are both fine, but this is hardly up there with either of their best performances, and the three younger actors playing Jonas (Brenton Thwaites), Fiona (Odeya Rush) and Asher (Cameron Monaghan) were pretty appalling, although they vastly improved as the film went on.

The most interesting part of the film for me, was its significant and select use of colour, utilised not just as a visual motif but as a plot-point. Beginning in black & white, colours slowly bleach in and out throughout the story, emerging with increasing contrast and intensity. The colourists have done a fantastic job with this film.

However, interesting cinematic elements aside, this film fell flat for me. It's certainly not a terrible movie but, although it did improve a fair bit towards the end, it was just too little, too late. It's a shame to see a film that clearly had potential become, for want of a better word, pedestrian.