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From ZERO to 6 ♥s. 100% ad-free. Run on pure love for movies, documentaries and TV-series. June 2025: Countdown to: Top 10: Best horror comedy movies - Upcoming review: There's Still Tomorrow (2023)
A pleasant-looking - and pretty packed - poster for Cameron Crowe's We Bought a Zoo
A widower and father of two children, who are still struggling with intense grief over the loss of their mother, makes a fresh decision in quitting his job and moving them all to the countryside to a closure-threatened zoo.
We Bought a Zoo is a wholesome film that has something for the whole family as it takes a true story and glosses it up, Hollywood-style. It is elevated by a circle of fine performances from well-cast actors:
Matt Damon (The Departed (2006)) is excellent in the lead; Thomas Haden Church (Cardboard Boxer (2016)) is at times wonderful as his comic sidekick brother; John Michael Higgins (Big Miracle (2012)) as a cantankerous park inspector is a good fit for the funny-man. Both children, - Colin Ford (All Kids Count (2011)) and Maggie Elizabeth Jones (Identity Thief (2013)), - do good jobs, and Jones as Rosie Mee is unreasonably cute at the same time. Add Scarlett Johansson (A Good Woman (2004)) as a sweet zookeeper with something at stake, and you have the main players of the film.
We get lots of really neat footage with animals in the all-around handsome production, which also features several delightful songs that underpin the story's message, which is about responding 'why not' more often to the opportunities in life instead of mechanical 'whatever.' The film's original songs are by Jon Thor Birgisson (Aloha (2015)) of Icelandic band Sigur Rós, some of them co-written with great Californian co-writer/co-producer/director Cameron Crowe (Almost Famous (2000))
The film succeeds sometimes in being touching, funny and uplifting, even though it borders on feeling like a parody at times, a parody of the film it so earnestly want to be; relevant but always family-focused; a bit like a faith-based film - without the faith. It is in-step with the very sweet, almost other-worldly universe that most Crowe films take place in.
We Bought a Zoo is written by Aline Brosh McKenna (Annie (2014)) and Crowe, based on Benjamin Mee's autobiographical novel We Bought a Zoo: The Amazing True Story of A Young Family, A Broken Down Zoo, and the 200 Wild Animals That Change Their Lives (2008).
[We Bought a Zoo was released December 23 and runs 124 minutes. Several things are changed from Mee's true story, including moving the plot from England to California. Crowe went to see Damon on the set of True Grit (2010) to convince him to play the lead. Filming took place in California in and around January 2011. The film opened #6 to a 9.3 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it actually went on to do better in the three following weeks in nearly the same amount of cinemas (3,117 - 3,163), (which is quite rare), although never going above #6, indicating strong word-of-mouth. It grossed 75.6 mil. $ (63 % of the total gross) domestically. The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were Australia with 7.7 mil. $ (6.4 %) and Japan with 5.3 mil. $ (4.4 %). Roger Ebert gave the film 2½/4 stars, equal to this review. We Bought a Zoo is fresh at 66 % with a 6.3 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]
Richard Parker the Bengal tiger looks at us in all his stunning beauty on the poster for Ang Lee's Life of Pi
Piscine Patel is telling the story of his life to a writer: Of how he got named after a Parisian swimming pool, which made him a victim of bullying in his school days in India. And of how his father's decision to sell their zoo and move all the animals to Canada led him on an terrible, - and amazing, - perilous journey.
Life of Pi is an adaptation of Spanish Yann Martel's (Self (1996)) same-titled 2001 novel by Oscar-nominated David Magee (Finding Neverland (2004)) and directed by Oscar-winning Taiwanese master filmmaker Ang Lee (The Ice Storm (1997)). The adventurous story lives on some great themes: Loss, survival, sacrifice, loneliness and not least belief in God. Life of Pi won me totally over the second time I saw it, as its unusual ending required that I saw it twice to really appreciate it. The film is in fact a complex near-parable. - Not your average 3D mega-movie! Suraj Sharma (Million Dollar Arm (2014)), (who reportedly won the part after auditions of 3,000 young men!), gives a strong, Oscar-worthy lead performance. Pi is a visual cornucopia of colors and wild nature-impressions from first frame to last. Life of Pi seems like a gift to humanity, an invitation to believe and to see the beauty and the wonders of God's creation everywhere around us. A truly inspiring masterpiece, not to be missed! And Lee's best film yet, in my opinion, although I have only seen 6 of his 12 features. He is now working on the eagerly anticipated war comedy Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk (2016).
Cost: 120 mil. $ Box office: 609 mil. $ = Big hit [Pi had a long development, dating back to 2003, and both M. Night Shyamalan, Alfonso Cuarón and Jean-Pierre Jeunet were attached to direct at different stages. (Shyamalan left to direct Lady in the Water (2006) instead, a big mistake on his part.) Shooting took months in 2011 in India, Taiwan, (including 2½ months in the world's largest self-generating wave-tank there), and Canada. Lee shot scenes with Tobey Maguire as the writer but scrapped them and reshot with a less familiar face in the role, (Rafe Spall.) The majority of the incredible visual effects for the film were created by Oscar-winning Rhythm & Hues Studios, who went bankrupt in February 2013, sparking protests by enraged VFX people outside the Oscar ceremony that did not tolerate mention of the industry debacle. Audiences braved Hurricane Sandy that put large parts of New York and the East coast under water and went to see Pi, a film without major stars, but marketed as the next Avatar (2009), giving it a 30.5 mil. $ North-American first, extended Thanksgiving weekend. It grossed 124.7 mil. $ in North America (20.5 % of the total gross.) Its 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were China (90.8 mil. $/14.9 %) and the UK (45.4 mil. $/7.5 %). It was #1 for 3 weeks in China, Australia and Chile and the biggest Hollywood hit of the year in India. It was nominated for 11 Oscars, winning 4, making it the top-winning movie of the year: Best Director, Cinematography, Score and Visual Effects. It made many a Top 10 list of the year, including Roger Ebert's #2 movie of the year, behind Argo (2012). Life of Pi is certified fresh at 87 % with a 7.9 critical average on Rotten Tomatoes.] What do you think of Life of Pi? Do you agree that it's Lee's best film yet?
