All the Little Animals (1998)

I love christian bale

I'm Korean..
So...My English is not very good...
What I really want to say is..... christian bale is a good player..
I love christian bale.. January 31, 2007

Is it a Psychological Drama, and Odd Couple Movie, or a Thriller?

Unfortunately, this movie doesn't know what kind of movie it is. It starts out as a psychological drama, even an odd couple movie, but then suddenly, unexpectedly veers into a thriller. If they wanted it to be a thriller, they needed to show more of the evil side of 'Fats' much earlier in the movie. If they wanted it to be a psychological drama, then they needed to peacefully overcome the evil of 'Fats' to show that Bobby could have a fulfilling life, even with his intellectual limitations. Both aspects of the movie are very good, but they simply don't reasonably fit together. Because the acting of John Hurt and Christian Bale is excellent, it is worth watching. (Rarely is a normal intelligence actor able to believably play a truly simple character, but Mr. Bale does the best job I've ever seen.) January 4, 2007

Nice, that they fixed the DVD description!

Unfortunately, I purchased this movie from Amazon when they were still claiming that it was available in a wide screen format! Alas, when it arrived in fullscreen, I was really bummed out. It's a great film and as such, it really deserves a proper presentation. I suggest following it up with a viewing of American Psycho. The polarity of Bale's performances in each of these films is almost frightening.... March 13, 2006

Absolutely Beautiful

As has been noted, this is an allegorical film and people will often divide down the middle over allegories. If you appreciate them and like digging beneath the surface, this is a remarkable film in a great many regards. Even as just a basic tale, the film works and is given outstanding performances by the three principal actors. Not enough good can be said about Christian Bale, who is maturing one of the finest actors we have today. Here, Bale is playing his exact age, 24, but looks no more than 17. As Bobby is mildly retarded due to a childhood accident of which he has more than one scar to serve as reminder, he is eternally a boy trapped in a man's body. When it comes to playing "damaged goods" Bale pulls off the nearly impossible, making you forget the actor and see only the character. (This was my primary difficulty with Forrest Gump, where everything seemed to draw attention to Mr. Hanks' brilliant "acting.")

Bobby isn't too dim to sense the evil of his stepfather "The Fat" aka Mr. De Winter, and upon his mother's death, realizes the man is out to do him serious harm. By refusing to sign over to The Fat, his inheritances, including the family's successful London department store, Bobby has sealed his fate. The Fat is going to have him declared mad and institutionalized for the remainder of his life. Bobby escapes the mansion, and wends his way towards Cornwall in search of his grandfather. The journey is brief, but symbolic as he finds rides along the trek, a young, hippy family in a van, complete with happy little dog, and an odious trucker whose zest for killing animals in the road causes his death. Wanting to help the trapped, barely alive trucker we stumble upon Mr. Summers (John Hurt) an odd hermit with a few affectations and full of mystery. An unlikely relationship develops between the two men, as Bobby finally finds the father figure denied him all his life. Summers takes Bobby in and instructs him in "The Work" - caring for the burial of animals killed at the hands (and wheels) of man. These scenes, shot in and around Cornwall, are dazzling . . . breathtakingly beautiful.

Inevitably their idyllic existence gives way to the reemergence of The Fat and confrontation, danger, resolution and acceptance. It's a beautiful tale of good versus evil and innocence versus cunning. The acting is uniformly excellent, with a truly stunning performance by Mr. Bale.
September 12, 2005

All in all, pretty good

All the Little Animals follows the off-kilter adventures of Bobby Platt (Christian Bale), a young man who's been left a simpleton by the long-ago car accident that damaged his brain but not his soul. He wholeheartedly loves animals and he's got a pet mouse named Peter, but Bobby has to keep Peter hidden from his wicked stepfather, De Winter (Daniel Benzali). Unable to handle De Winter's abuse any longer Bobby runs away, hitchhiking from London to Cornwall, where he meets Mr. Summers (John Hurt). Summers is a quiet man who's devoted his life to giving dead animals a reverent burial, and he trains Bobby to follow in his footsteps.

Even though the movie's title is All the Little Animals, there aren't any developed animal characters. Peter is cute, but he's out of the picture pretty quick. The rest are corpses, or depicted in wistful dream sequences (the fox is a fixture, and there's also an otter, a horse and a beaver). The human characters are sort of one-dimensional - particularly The Fat - but the actors are all superb. Benzali and Hurt's reputations precede them, but Bale is very underrated. That may change when his high-profile role of Batman hits the big screen, but as of now the general public doesn't know him. He's an actor of great range, proven by his equally convincing portrayals of simple and sweet Bobby Platt in All the Little Animals and diabolical, murderous Patrick Bateman in American Psycho shortly after.

Staci Layne Wilson
January 18, 2005

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