Movie Review
Here
PG-13
GENRE
Drama
CAST
Tom Hanks as Richard; Robin Wright as Margaret; Paul Bettany as Al; Kelly Reilly as Rose; Michelle Dockery as Mme Harter; Gwilym Lee as John Harter; Ophelia Lovibond as Stella Beekman; David Fynn as Leo Beekman; Zsa Zsa Zemeckis as Vanessa
DIRECTOR
Robert Zemeckis
DISTRIBUTOR
Sony Pictures
IN THEATERS
November 1, 2024
REVIEWER
Bob Hoose
Movie Review
If you were alone in 2024 and gazing at the darkened, quiet end of this colonial home’s living room, you’d probably think it had always been the same since the day it was built. The same bay window, same pine-plank floors, same cozy-but-now-cold fireplace.
You might never imagine that there was actually thick carpet overlaying those floors in the ‘50s or heavy drapes hanging in the ‘30s. You might never picture the funeral or the wedding that both took place in this same room, decades apart. And you probably wouldn’t conceive that hundreds of years ago, dinosaurs trod through this very spot before the coming ice age.
If, however, someone could strap a time machine to your back (and maybe give you an invisibility hat?) and you could stand where you are and jump around through the years to see all there was to see.
There was the Native American couple who knelt here to commit their love to one another, for instance, when it was only a patch of forested shrubs. A wannabe aviator and his prim-and-proper wife once stood and gazed out this very window. And don’t look past the war vet who’s walking in with partial hearing loss, emotional wounds and a tendency to drink to excess.
Yes, if you could travel like that, you’d see that there has been joy here. And heartbreak here. This place, this chunk of space right here, has seen a lot. If only you could only see it, too.
Are you watching?
Positive Elements
Here checks in with several different families throughout the film. That said, Richard and Margaret and their extended family members are the central characters in the story, while others are only seen on a few brief occasions. But all of the families and couples tend to communicate the positive things at their core.
We see three white couples/families, a Black family and a Native American couple in the story. And all participate in loving and tender moments ranging from incidental laughing joys, to birthday celebrations, to weddings, to rejoicing after a birth.
There are hardships, struggles, loses and difficult individuals in the mix, to be sure, but the film points to the fact that it’s the loving interactions (even the smallest ones) that can uplift and change lives.
Richard’s father, Al, for instance, has a quick temper and a caustic attitude that he regularly aims at those around him. He never becomes a particularly likeable man, but we see how his wife, Rose, gently counters his angry side and guide him in better directions. And it becomes evident that his love for her is ultimately the most valuable thing in his life.
The film also points out that very difficult things in life can become a benefit in the end. When an elderly Al breaks his hip and has to move in with Richard and Margaret, for example, it’s initially seen as a horrible turn of events. But much later, Richard admits that his constant contact helped him reconnect and reconcile with his father.
Some characters apologize for their bad choices. And we see couples and family members express their love for one another.
Spiritual Elements
There are a few light references to spirituality here. For instance, when Margaret finds daughter Vanessa’s lost school ribbon, the family celebrates, and Vanessa declares: “God put it there, because I prayed.” And by movie’s end, there is a suggestion that this small incident was an unexpectedly special moment indeed.
Well before the house is built, a Native American couple lifts their newborn up to the moon in a spiritual dedication.
After a terrible incident, a very drunk Al calls out to God for help. And then he immediately begins throwing out his stash of liquor bottles, turning over a new leaf of sobriety.
Someone says, “your lips to God’s ears” during a discussion.
Sexual & Romantic Content
Someone quotes Ben Franklin, who was supposedly talking about his female conquests overseas, as saying, “They do not tell, they do not swell and they’re grateful as h—.”
Al casually admits to Richard that he once invited a woman back to his room while off on a business trip.
A young wife in the 1940s dances around in a skimpy top and silky briefs while vacuuming the house. She and her husband kiss on several occasions and begin to make out while together on a reclining La-Z-Boy chair. We also see hubby taking pictures of her dressed in a slightly revealing outfit.
Teens Richard and Margaret make out on the family sofa (fully dressed) before being surprised by his squealing and laughing siblings. Years later he talks of them having sex on that sofa on a different occasion, an incident evidenced by Margaret’s unexpected pregnancy. She and Richard quickly marry.
When she’s about nine months pregnant, Margaret steps out into the shadowed living room dressed in a shear negligée. (We can’t see details, but her full form is evident.) Later, we see, at a distance, two paintings of Margaret—one in the negligée and one reclining naked on a sofa—that Richard has painted.
Margaret’s water breaks in the living room and the fire department must rush in and help her give birth (though that event isn’t shown). In another time period, Margaret seductively beckons Richard up to their bedroom. He unbuckles his pants and waddles to the doorway with his pants around his ankles.
In the distant past, we see the clothed native American couple lay down in the grass to passionately embrace. The woman, we learn, becomes pregnant and gives birth to a small child (also offscreen).
When Richard and Margaret’s daughter, Vanessa, grows into a teen during the 1970s, we see her in hot pants and a formfitting exercise leotard.
Violent Content
Dinosaurs stomp past the camera’s eye. Soon after that, a meteor crashes to the Earth and obliterates everything, obviously sending the world into an ice age.
Thirtysomething Al is shipped back to the US with broken eardrums, thanks to his last battle (where 1,100 men died). He tells a young Richard about seeing a fellow soldier’s jaw blown off by a bullet.
A heavyset man has a heart attack and falls face first to the floor. Someone has a stroke and falls off a ladder (offscreen). We see her after the fact, face down on the floor. Native Americans carry a deceased person up close to the camera’s eye.
We hear that Al fell and broke his hip.
The house’s roof caves in at one point, flooding the floor with rain water. Someone dies from influenza, another from COVID-19 (both offscreen). An open-casket funeral is held in the family room.
Black parents sit down with their son and go through the “necessary” steps for being safe when approached by a white policeman.
Crude or Profane Language
We hear one f-word and four s-words in the dialogue. Those vulgarities are joined by nearly 10 uses of “d–n,” and several uses each of “a–” and “b–tard.” There are a couple of crude references made to the male anatomy. God and Jesus’ names are both misused a total of a dozen times (the former paired with “d–n” in five of instances.)
Drug and Alcohol Content
Al smokes and drinks to excess. And we see him visibly inebriated. Others (including Richard and Margaret) drink wine with dinner. And a couple celebrates with glasses of champagne and cocktails.
Other Noteworthy Elements
On her 50th birthday, a wife looks back upon her life and publicly laments having to give up on her “career dreams” for the sake of marriage and family. Her husband laments walking away from his dreams as well. But it’s the wife’s pressing regrets, and the prompting of a “life counselor,” that drives her to separate from her husband.
Conclusion
Someone once said that life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans. The film Here takes that sentiment and tweaks it just a bit to deliver this plea: Don’t let the important things of life go unnoticed while you’re busy making other plans.
Director Robert Zemeckis takes some interesting creative risks to help communicate that request.
Zemeckis and crew present an imaginative play, of sorts, that addresses the passage of time, life and family. It’s all presented through a single, fixed-frame view of one particular space as the “story” jumps through it over millennia.
That fixed image changes from dino-stomping ground to forest to field and eventually becomes the bay-windowed living room of a small colonial home. And as we continue to hopscotch back and forth through time, our view is overlayed with snapshot-like highlights—appearing on the screen like family pics plucked from a photo album.
And it soon becomes clear that the single camera tableau isn’t focusing on a space at all; it’s the people, the couples, and families filling it that give it importance. That’s, frankly, a yeasty, experimental movie tack that some will love, some will hate, and some just won’t have the patience to sit through.
Of course, viewers of every persuasion will also have to deal with the heavy drinking and smoking in some scenarios; some references to affairs and sexuality, both visual and verbal; and some pretty coarse language.
However, if you can make it through, there are excellent performances (Robin Wright is a standout) here, and an emotional declaration that our worries about the regrets and the grinds of life are meaningless. It’s the small moments of family, love and grace that make our passage worthwhile, the film tells us.
That’s, frankly, a time-worthy reminder for us all.