Forever Young is a simple, easily accessible film. The acting is strong. Without excessive insistence, the film provides amusing contrasts between 1939 and 1992. The images of the B25 were a pleasure. The rapid aging of Mel Gibson is convincing and provides an interesting contrast with Citizen Kane : make-up artists have made progress. One interesting theme is the loss and recovery of a line of research. The occasional spurt ahead by a gifted scientist who is only caught up to decades later by the general level of scientific knowledge. The basic plot is that the lead character is frozen in a sort of experiment in cryonics (but applied to a healthy, not recently dead person) in 1939, and accidentally unfrozen only in 1992. Around that theme there is a touching love story and re-meeting 50 years later between Mel Gibson and Isabel Glasser. In the middle of the film the action is well carried by Jamie Lee Curtis as a single mother looking for a father for her child - extremely well-played by Elijah Wood. Nicolas Surovy is convincing in the difficult role of the doctor/boyfriend of Jamie Lee Curtis, having to be both understanding, but slightly jealous when Mel Gibson comes into her life. The weak part of the film is that cryonics is utterly implausible, at least for the foreseeable future of medical science, despite having some believers. Not a great film, but an enjoyable one that is also appropriate for kids.
Review of Forever Young
