Reviews of Danny Boyle’s “127 Hours” starring James Franco have hit from the 2010 Telluride Film Festival. Boyle was last at the festival two years ago to unspool “Slumdog Millionaire” which went on to critical and box office success and of course, Oscar glory.
The film is based on the true story of mountain climber Aron’s Ralston’s (Franco) extraordinary survival tale after he found himself trapped under a boulder and faced with the decision to amputate his own arm. The cast also includes Amber Tamblyn, Lizzy Caplan, Kate Mara and Clémence Poésy and features work from two cinematographers, Anthony Dod Mantle and Enrique Chediak. How did it fare? Let’s jump right in:
The L.A. Times says the film cuts an impressive swath. “Many tears were shed at the world premiere screening of “127 Hours” at the Telluride Film Festival on Saturday afternoon. But few in the audience of some 500 cried harder than Aron Ralston, the hiker who famously cut off his right forearm and is the subject of director Danny Boyle’s new movie.”
Hitfix called the film a visceral and uplifiting experience. He also thinks Franco is awards-bound. “James Franco… gives the best performance of his career as Ralston. Having to captivate the dramatic ups and downs of Alston’s ordeal over five days is no easy task and Franco channels the outdoor lover’s energy and enthusiasm throughout. There is a small list of filmmaker who have achieved creative success with back-to-back films over the years, but with ‘127 Hours’ Danny Boyle has just joined the club.”
Deadline’s Peter Hammond says the film is definitely an Awards hopeful, calling out Franco’s performance in particular. “It’s a tour-de-force for Franco, virtually never off screen in the same way Spencer Tracy triumphed in the similarly spare The Old Man And The Sea (1958). Franco’s performance could put him in contention for a best actor Oscar nod just as Tracy’s did over 50 years ago.”
Cinematical makes it clear that the film definitely isn’t for the squeamish calling it “gut-wrenching in a queasy, horror-movie way – a shield-your-eyes-from-the-screen, chuckle-in-relieved-astonishment sort of experience, done incredibly well.”
The NY Times‘ A.O. Scott is clearly enthusiastic for the film as well. “His experience is disconcerting enough just to think about, and to see it recreated, in Mr. Boyle’s characteristically fast-moving, immersive style, is jarring, thrilling and weirdly funny. At a question-and-answer session after the first screening on Saturday afternoon, Mr. Boyle — director of “Trainspotting,” “28 Days Later” and of course “Slumdog Millionaire,” which snuck into Telluride two years ago — described himself as a thoroughly “urban” type with no great love for or interest in nature. And the jangly, jumpy energy he brings to a story of silence, solitude and confinement gives the film an irreverent kick that deepens and sharpens its emotional and spiritual insights.”Variety sings praises for the film as well noting, “Danny Boyle has taken us to the surface of the sun (“Sunshine”) and the end of the world as we know it (“28 Days Later”), testing the limits of human endurance with each radically different project. “127 Hours” takes the adrenaline rush one step further, pitting man against nature in the most elemental of struggles as Boyle compresses the true story of rock-climbing junkie Aron Ralston, who spent five days wrestling with a boulder after a rockslide pinned his arm against a canyon wall, into an intense 93 minutes.”
In Contention is a naysayer and feels the picture and its ideas run out of steam and isn’t quite sure what its awards season prospects will be. “I wonder if the Academy will respond to a chamber piece such as this, and one that inevitably dips into the gruesome. I found some of Boyle’s visual ideas to be running out of gas by the end of the film, and I imagine others might feel burdened by a sense of repetition, too.”
/Film is on board as well, calling the film “a brilliant, gut-wrenching and moving cinematic experience. The film will have you in tears one moment, laughing the next, and will leave you on the edge of your seat, gripping the armrests and holding your breath” though their counterpart Firstshowing wasn’t as moved by the experience as they were by the similar one-man show of Ryan Reynolds’ “Buried” saying “I’m not saying it’s a bad film by any means, it’s actually a great film, but I just couldn’t get into as much as I could Slumdog Millionaire or Buried and therefore I couldn’t love as much as either of those.”
“127 Hours” hits theaters in limited release starting November 5. We’ll see it next week at the Toronto Intl. Film Festival.