Robert A
The Giver
The Special Story
Genre: sci-fi
SPOILER ALERT!!! IN THIS REVIEW I WILL BE SAYING MOSTLY EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENED DURING THE MOVIE. “The Giver” was made by Lois Lowrey and released in 1993. This book was then turned into a movie in 2014. The main characters are Jonas, Chief Elder, The Giver, and a special guest was Tayler Swift. This movie was made kids and for the now adults who read the book when they were younger. This movie has won one award and that was the John Newbery Medal. Now enough with the facts about the book and the movie now let's get started with what is making you read this. Today I will be reviewing this movie and giving you guys my thoughts about it. This movie was an ok movie. The reason I say this is because they skipped a lot of things. Although they did a very good job on it, they just didn't really meet my requirements. First of all, the beginning of the movie was pretty accurate to the book. After that they had the ceremony of 12. Although they did do the ceremony, the part when they kept repeating “Jonas” kind of creeped me out. Anyways, After that Jonas went to his first day of training. A cool thing that I liked about the movie is how there is a big piece of land and it's surrounded by clouds. I just find it interesting how no one was brave enough to go past the clouds until Jonas was born (I will get into that later). Once Jonas got to The Givers place, he was asked to sit down. The Giver then says to get closer and tells Jonas that there is nothing he can do to prepare him for what's about to come. The Giver then puts both his hands on his arms and shows Jonas what's past the clouds and shows him what the world really is. I am not going to lie, this part was very interesting and cool. I say this because it's like showing so many new things about life to a little kid. This is also kind of scary at the same time because you then know new things have bad things that come with it. For example, The Giver accidentally shows Jonas the memory of war which scared the hell out of Jonas and made him scared of dying and others dying too. Moving on to the next part. Jonas finds out what having someone released means (killing them) and also finds out that they are releasing Gabe (baby that Jonas has a very special connection with). He then tells his friend/girlfriend that he is leaving and going beyond the clouds and asks her to come with him. She says she can't but she does help him escape by acting like she's taking a baby with her while running away from the people who try to catch Jonas and prevent him from escaping. He's then being chased by them and then BOOMMM, he jumps into the clouds leaving the people confused. He's on the run now and having planes look for him to return him. His friend Asher is one of the pilots and once he finds Jonas, Jonas then says “friends forever” then tries to run away, but then gets captured. Asher then lets go of Jonas flying over a river. Asher then gets a call through his glasses by the Chief Elder (main leader) and asks if she killed Jonas. Asher says that the job is done then flies back to the piece of land, leaving Jonas and Gabe to find the pillars. The whole reason why Jonas is escaping is to save his friend/girlfriend from dying and to give the whole city the ability to see color and make it a better place. Jonas then walks through deserts, rivers, and mountains. At the mountains, he passes out with Gabe in his hands and wakes up to find a sled. He rides it down this hill and eventually goes through the pillars. This causes everyone in the piece of land to finally see colors and feel emotions and not live like robots. This also saves the life of Fiona (the girlfriend). Overall this movie was a 3.5 out of 5 because there could have been a lot more things that were in the book but it's ok because there were some cool things in it. Thank you for reading this and sorry if I spoiled a lot more than you expected.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
02/13/25
Full Review
Coolin's M
Hated the movie just like I hated the book
Rated 0.5/5 Stars •
Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars
12/16/24
Full Review
Croft T
The Giver, a 2014 Phillip Noyce film that takes place in what seems to be a utopia. A community free of war, violence, pain and suffering due to its strict conformity of ridding the community of emotions and memories. Brenton Thwaites plays a character named Jonas, a smart and capable teenager that is selected by “the community” to be the receiver of memory, which grants him access to learn about the rest of humanity and the truth of the real world throughout history. Jeff Bridges plays a mysterious man that’s known by the community as “The Giver”, The Giver acts as a mentor to Jonas and reveals the truth of how his community came to be and all of the shady actions that must happen to keep the utopia running.
The film’s plot attempts to display all the themes in a simple format but is unable to balance the story plot’s depth with a simple understanding. Despite the very interesting plot, the fast pace storytelling makes the story feel rushed. The setting is excellently portrayed throughout the film as it displays the patterned perfection of the community with a clean monochromatic aesthetic. As Jonas experiences memories of the “real world” the world slowly gains vibrance. Lastly, the character development varies from person to person. For example, The Givers character balances his wisdom and mentorship attitude with fear and melancholyness, because he knows how hurtful and powerful the memories of the real world are. Similarly with Jonas, he has an advances character arc that you see unfold, he starts with the same knowledge as every other clueless citizen but as he learns more he starts to question everything about his reality, and does a great job at displaying all the moral dilemmas with keeping the truth a secret from the community. However, for other characters like Chief Elder, played by Meryl Streep, who has significant importance throughout the climax, however, is very underly explained, leaving a gap of the story unknown.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
11/21/24
Full Review
Victor G
Good movie really enjoyed it if they had the cgi that we have now bck then this movie would’ve been a hit possibly even a sequels because it just ended when he found the cabin
Rated 5/5 Stars •
Rated 5 out of 5 stars
11/20/24
Full Review
Daniel T
As a book adaptation, it would score lower. There are way too many differences, the producers and writers took to many liberties and important aspects are lost or seem overlooked. However, the stellar cast and the performances are to my opinion excellent. As an English teacher I tend to use this movie as a comparison with the source material, with the purpose of the students analyzing, comparing, and at times evaluating the adaptation made. So, as a movie adaptation of the book, I consider it regular, but as a vehicle for teaching and learning, I give a much higher rating.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
11/13/24
Full Review
Mason M
I usually don't do ratings this low, but I have a particular hatred for this film. It's a bad film in the first place, but it's also such a disservice to the book. The book is so amazingly done and written and this movie just takes everything that was good about the book, and just gets rid of it for some reason. The result is a quite dumb movie, without much of a purpose. I would love to see a well made adaption of The Giver, and this is not it.
Rated 0.5/5 Stars •
Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars
10/13/24
Full Review
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