Saw "Cradle" at a Writers Guild screening in New York (Nov, 1999) which offered post-screening interview with creator Tim Robbins. Mr. Robbins, an intelligent, if not truly intellectual, handsome, engaging, unpretentious artist, was so much more entertaining and absorbing in the few moments he spoke with the audience than was the case with almost all of his over-long two hours-long-plus movie.
The movie informs, but it neither enlightens nor entertains. The remarkable cast does its best to keep up with Robbins' vision of a modern-day version 1940s screwball-comedy farce, but this devotion to a cinematic form, and a comparable commitment to historical accuracy and costuming, only distracts Robbins from any artist's true goal: engaging story and characters. There is none of this in "Cradle." It is pure pastiche, mere montage, with too all the time and $30 million spent on atmosphere, not flesh-and-blood authenticity.
Robbins admitted that a writer friend of his read the script and told him it didn't work and advised him not to undertake the movie. But he did, and now believes what Joe Roth, Disney's studio chief, probably apparently told him: that the studio "loves" the movie. (Though certainly no one in marketing or publicity or sales or 'profit' can love it!)
Well, Joe Roth is a decent man raised as the loving child of dedicated left-wingers. I admire him for that, as I admire his loyalty to Robbins' intensity and intentions, but "Cradle" is a a hopelessly flawed, irrelevant boring movie experience.
The movie informs, but it neither enlightens nor entertains. The remarkable cast does its best to keep up with Robbins' vision of a modern-day version 1940s screwball-comedy farce, but this devotion to a cinematic form, and a comparable commitment to historical accuracy and costuming, only distracts Robbins from any artist's true goal: engaging story and characters. There is none of this in "Cradle." It is pure pastiche, mere montage, with too all the time and $30 million spent on atmosphere, not flesh-and-blood authenticity.
Robbins admitted that a writer friend of his read the script and told him it didn't work and advised him not to undertake the movie. But he did, and now believes what Joe Roth, Disney's studio chief, probably apparently told him: that the studio "loves" the movie. (Though certainly no one in marketing or publicity or sales or 'profit' can love it!)
Well, Joe Roth is a decent man raised as the loving child of dedicated left-wingers. I admire him for that, as I admire his loyalty to Robbins' intensity and intentions, but "Cradle" is a a hopelessly flawed, irrelevant boring movie experience.