Life of Pi

You know it’s bad when the only reason you go to see a movie is so you can repeat a pseudo racist joke over and over again until your friends finally decide it’s not that funny anymore. Sad thing is with the viewing of Ang Lee’s Hulk, the joke never got old and is still funny to this day. “Don’t make me anglee, you wont like me when I’m anglee!” – David Banner. If you laughed at this then yes you too are a horrible person but dammit it was worth the price of admission. Now of course he didn’t actually say anglee but imagining that he did was the only thing that made that trash watchable. Well that and a drunk Nick Nolte. Then let us not forget Crouching Tiger, which was an OK movie but people flying through trees while lovingly gazing into each other’s eyes is a little too fruity for me, especially when it’s supposed to be a kung fu movie. And don’t get me started on Brokeback Mountain, although sitting in a theater that was completely caught off guard when the trailer was just starting to get it’s initial run remains one of the funniest moments in my personal cinematic history. They showed it right before Constantine, so lets just say it didn't go over too well with the comic book crowd. Now I know I sound like a borderline homophobic racist but in reality it’s all just misdirected hatred for an over hyped director in Lee. His movies are always just ok and never really deserve the praise they get.  I admit that I did actually see Bareback Mountain and it wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be but it also wasn’t the poetry that everyone tried to make it out to be.  I mean how poetic is watching Heath Ledger spit in his own hand with the intention of using it as lube? And before I say something redneck like “Some of my best friends are black”, let’s move on to Life of Pi aka Life of Pee on You (drip drip drip).

In the movie the first syllable of Pi’s name sounds like pee so he changes it to the numerical value Pi so the kids will stop making fun of him. Pi’s amazing story is told Forrest Gump style by the adult version of PI, Irrfan Khan and you're taken through 30 minutes of pretty boring set up. The only interesting thing that happens is Pi’s first encounter with Richard Parker, the family’s first Bengal tiger in their zoo. This is where he learns the true nature of animals. You are also exposed to Pi’s discovery of different religions, all of which he takes a liking to and adopts their customs. 

Once you get through that, they skip a few years later to a slightly older Pi who now faces the news of his family needing to sell the zoo and move to Canada for work. On the way to Canada, there is a terrible storm and it looks like Pi is the only one who is able to escape in a life boat along with a few of the zoo’s animals. One of which, just happens to be Richard Parker. Now the rest I will leave for you to experience on your own but just know that this movie basically takes on the form of Castaway. However,  instead of being stuck on an island, Pi is stuck in the middle of the Pacific in a boat. 

Now this movie looks absolutely amazing and it’s totally worth the 3D price. The crashing of the boat rivals what you saw in James Cameron’s Titanic and every sea creature you run into looks awesome. For more than half the movie your jaw is dropped at some of the visuals, but the only problem is this movie is 120 minutes long. That’s a long time to watch a human interact with animals that can’t talk. So after a while you do get bored, especially when the end rolls around. Now before I talk about the main plot twist, let me give you my rating so nothing is ruined. Overall this movie is pretty WEAK but I’d suggest seeing it in the theater if you’re bored.

***spoiler alert***

For the first 118 minutes, you believe that Pi is stuck on a boat with Richard Parker and a few other animals initially. But you then find out at the end that it’s all just a metaphor for something horrible that actually happened on the life boat. So essentially you realize that the first 2 hours of the movie were basically meaningless and that Irrfan could have summed up his totally unimpressive real version of what actually happened in a 5 minute story over a beer. Total waste of time and I left the movie anglee!!! Lee should have pulled a Spike Lee and had Pi throw Richard Parker a fish from the hospital while Richard P leaps in the air from the beach and catches it in his mouth. That was a He Got Game reference if you didn’t catch it, no pun intended. Ok I’m out.