WE ARE INFINITE.
In high school, a freshman with a dark past (Logan Lerman) makes friends with a couple of seniors (Emma Watson, Ezra Miller) who are outsiders. Stephen Chbosky turned his own novel into a successful film that finds a compelling balance between the charms of the high school genre and a few darker ingredients, some of which are slowly revealed. Builds to a satisfying emotional climax without getting completely bogged down in all the difficulties facing its characters at such a delicate age. A touching celebration of friendship and an honest portrait of young love, solidly directed, and brought to life by an excellent cast, especially Lerman and Watson.
2012-U.S. 103 min. Color. Produced by Lianne Halfon, John Malkovich. Novel, screenplay and direction by Stephen Chbosky. Cast: Logan Lerman (Charlie Kelmeckis), Emma Watson (Sam), Ezra Miller (Patrick), Mae Whitman, Kate Walsh, Dylan McDermott… Paul Rudd, Joan Cusack, Tom Savini.
Trivia: At one point, John Hughes allegedly tried to get the movie made.
Last word: “Ted Tally who wrote the adaptation of ‘Silence of the Lambs’, a tremendous screenwriter, he had the best quote I ever heard about adapting where he said it’s basically turning soup back into bullion, and I love that analogy. You’re not changing it, you’re distilling it. You’re getting the story and the characters into their absolute central essence and it takes some back and forth, it takes overwriting and then taking out a few scenes then overwriting again, just to get the tone calibrated perfectly, but once you have it, it works. That’s what the process is. Nothing’s changed, it just got clarified.” (Chbosky, Coming Soon)
