Water for Elephants

“The rules of this United States of Suckers do not apply to us.” Did you feel that? A delicious line delivered by Christoph Waltz who crafts one of the more universal and despised villains to ever star on the silver screen. Indeed, the circus movie is back. Along with Reese Witherspoon and Robert Pattinson who had no choice but to elevate their already ascending acting efforts to capture the forbidden, and yet inspiring love affair between the ‘nobody’ Jacob (Pattinson) and Waltz’ character wife Marlena (Witherspoon). Notably, director Francis Lawrence, having progressed from making music videos for Britney “Super (pregnant) (dying) star” Spears and popular acronym JLO, is certainly taking his next step in his film-career as well. Additionally, all of these (if not already, soon to be) first-rate performers have very much heightened a mediocre script based on the novel by Sara Gruen. While the film’s writing is far from unimpressive, it simply cannot convey the intricacy of the characters' romance as well as its source material. But that’s to be expected. What may be unexpected, however, is Pattinson who sure can act when he doesn’t have to wear glitter and say things like “the lion fell in love with a lamb.” Water for Elephants is a sophisticated, passionate tale of two men and their fight for the woman they both claim to love and inescapably a solid, dashing film.  Tag line: Lions, tigers, Robert, oh my! But hey, you can’t blame ‘em for trying to sell the prize pony. (Oddly enough, I don’t think there were any ponies in the film).  B+