Tuck Everlasting

Movie Title: Tuck Everlasting

Official Website (it might still work): Tuck Everlasting

Rating (out of 10): 4

Buy the: Video/DVD | Soundtrack

The Review:

Immortality. Interesting idea, and in a way, a current topic of discussion with baseball Hall of Famer Ted Williams being put in cryogenic stasis. With an average lifespan of approximately 80 years in this country, who wouldn’t want some extra years. After all, 80 years is just a spec of dust on the geologic timeline. Of course, there are downsides, but I really should talk about the movie.

In Tuck Everlasting we are introduced to the Tuck clan, a family of four whose residence is located deep in the woods in upstate New York (or at least that is where the novel by Natalie Babbitt sets the story). Angus Tuck (William Hurt, Changing Lanes) is the head of the house according to the census bureau, ruling over his two boys Jesse (Jonathan Jackson, Insomnia) and Miles (Scott Bairstow). Then there is Mae (Sissy Spacek, Blast from the Past), mother of the boys, and loving wife of Angus. To all outward appearances the family looks and acts normal, though they are a little behind the times of turn-of-the-century America where the automobile has started to infest the countryside. But the outward veneer hides a disturbing secret, a secret that most would not believe or understand. The secret is that this family has not aged one bit in 85 years (just like Dick Clark) since they all drank from a spring located in what have become their woods. Because of this secret, the family has lived in seclusion from their neighbors, though the boys do leave to go forth and explore the ever-shrinking world. They live in constant fear of being discovered, which they view as eventual with civilization ever encroaching upon their habitat. This fear grows as Miles and Jesse discover that they have been followed by a mysterious man wearing a yellow suit (Ben Kingsley, Rules of Engagement), but they believe they may have permanently lost this mysterious person. Then one day a young lady by the name of Winnie Foster (Alexis Bledel) wanders into the Tuck’s lives when she gets lost in the woods (her father owns the land) and Jesse discovers her. Jesse is immediately smitten with her, but must take the girl back to his father, with assistance from Miles, so the family can decide what to do with her. Miles wants to kill Winnie because of the hatred and rage he holds against normal people. This developed from when his wife and children left him after learning of his immortality. However, Angus allows Winnie to live and stay, and eventually discloses the family secret to her (also during this time she falls in love with Jesse). Meanwhile, Winnie’s father Robert (Victor Garber, Legally Blonde) and mother (Amy Irving, Traffic) are desperately trying to locate their missing daughter when the Man in the Yellow Suit appears to help them, but for a price. But his presence is foreboding to the Tuck family and to Winnie. To where the tension is created by the questions of will this man find the Tucks (and what exactly does he want), and will Winnie decide to drink from the secret spring and become immortal? Simplified, but then again, so is the movie.

Directing the film is Jay Russell. Others in the film include Bradley Coryell, Kosha Engler, Richard Pilcher, Naomi Kline, Sean Pratt, Kathryn Kelley, John Badila, and Elizabeth Shue as the narrator.

Tuck Everlasting seemed really simplified when dealing with a very complex issue such as immortality. Another point of contention for me is how the film seems to portray the Tucks as helpless animals fighting for survival (this may have come from the book) while at the same time demonstrating that they cannot be killed. This begs the question: What are they so afraid of since they cannot be afraid of being chastised, they already live secluded lives. On the upside, the film is very picturesque and Alexis Bledel is turning into quite an attractive young lady. Finally, I can only give Tuck Everlasting four couches out of ten.