DVD
REVIEW: RAIL AND TIES
06/15/08
SYNOPSIS: Kevin
Bacon and Marcia Gay Harden give soaring performances in
Rails & Ties, director Alison Eastwood's moving tale of
people in crisis and emotions at the brink. Bacon plays Tom
Stark, a train engineer unable to face his wife's (Harden)
illness. Then a terrifying railway collision leaves a little
boy orphaned. Tom takes the boy into his home and - step by
step, strength by strength - learns how to bond with the
wife he adores by opening his heart to a boy who needs the
security of a devoted family.
REVIEW: Let me start by saying that this movie could
perfectly be two good movies, since it shows two different
appealing stories: the first one, about a workaholic husband
who cannot deal with the assumption that his wife has cancer
and is about to die, the other one, a relationship between
an adult and a child who cross path after a terrible
accident, regrettably the script and situations are not well
managed to make one compelling story. In Rails and Ties
director Allison Eastwood tries to shows us two highly
moving and beautiful stories, unfortunately she fails making
the audience feel these emotions. It is not for the lack of
talent, since I must admit that Marcia Gay Garden and Miles
Heizer performances are great. Each of them perform their
characters with great precision making the audience feeling
somehow some compassion. This plus the remarkable skills of
Kevin Bacon make the movie visually entertaining and
enjoyable to certain point. The problem of the movie resides
in its story and the way it develops. It is just too fake.
For a movie genre that is supposed to resemble reality the
movie is presented with a sequence of events and characters
that are just not believable. The whole movie is a set of
overplayed terrible things happening to everyday good people
with a predictable feel good ending. It seems that the
writers took the two different good stories and tried to
merge it into a single story taking it to an extreme in an
effort to make the audience feel emotional. Not everything
is bad, the movie have some inspirational messages, like how
to deal with relationship problems, how to explained dead to
a child, and the importance of faith.
Rails and Ties although extremely illusory will keep you
entertained for the whole 101 minutes it last. The acting is
good, the stories are appealing, and the messages are
moving. Unfortunately, the situations and events might be
overplayed and exaggerated for my liking. The movie is like
watching a Sci-Fi movie with Godzilla, King Kong, and the
monster from Cloverfield, terrorizing one city one after the
other, finalizing with an appearance from Superman, the
Hulk, and Spawn solving the problem. It might be good to
watch to pass your time but you know that it is not
possible. I Recommend this movie for people who enjoy
watching movies from A&E and the Lifetime channel. The movie
will be available June 17 2008 and is rated PG-13 for mature
Thematic Elements, and accident scene, brief nudity, and
momentary strong language.
Review
By Milo
milo@smartcine.com
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VIDEO:
16x9 Widescreen
AUDIO:
English,
5.1 (Dolby Digital).
Subtitles - English Spanish
French - Optional
SPECIAL FEATURES: The
DVD itself does not have a large amount of special features,
it does not even have the standard menu like the making of,
casting, or makeup. The only special feature is a
compilation of deleted scenes that were well excluded since
it just have more overused situations.
Deleted Scenes:
A total of three Deleted scenes full of overused
circumstances that were excluded from the movie, one
includes Tom working in his train and remembering his
childhood which was similar to Davey, the other one a Davey
in the train station meeting another runaway child. (8:04)
RATING BREAK DOWN:
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