Munster Express Online

Susie Salmon is a young girl who is savagely murdered near her home just as her life has started to begin. Peter Jackson’s latest film is an adaptation of Alice Sebold’s novel and tries to show how her family members deal with their grief in different ways, how Susie must try and let go of Earth and how she begins to pity her killer.

Pretty much all the reviews I’ve read and heard about this film have been awful but I’ve read the book and seen the film and loved both. The novel’s beginning is almost sickeningly harsh as it goes into detail about how Suzie is horribly raped and murdered in an underground hut. I was glad when Jackson skimmed over these details and only hinted at what was happening but nonetheless, the scene was horrible and very terrifying.

Ronan gave a brilliant performance and showed great emotion throughout the film, especially in the more scary scenes such as when she watches Mr. Harvey in the bathtub covered in blood, which was so disgusting and awful that I wanted to close my eyes. However, I must say, it was Stanley Tucci’s performance as Mr. Harvey that blew me away; he was utterly terrifying.

Jackson’s camera work is at its best when he films Mr. Harvey, firstly in the underground hut and creates stomach-churning dread and then again in his house, where you see him at his twisted worst.

The most thrilling part of the whole film happens when Susie’s sister Lindsey breaks into Harvey’s house and the tension is almost unbearable. Susan Sarandon played Grandma Lynn perfectly and tries to help the family in her destructive alcoholic way. Susie’s parents had a much greater part in the novel and I think they should have been developed a little bit more than they were in the film.

The 3D purgatory is extremely beautiful one moment and then very scary the next, and for me that’s why it was most effective. Susie could be in a sledding down a snowy slope one minute and then be brought suddenly into the darkness of Mr. Harvey’s house.

I thoroughly enjoyed this film and I think the story is amazingly original but if you’re going to see it, be prepared to be thrilled.