Home | Movies By Year | Movies from 2010
Remember Me (2010 film)
Buy Remember Me (2010 film) now from AmazonFirst, read the Wikipedia article. Then, scroll down to see what other TopShelfReviews readers thought about the movie. And once you've experienced the movie, tell everyone what you thought about it.
Wikipedia article
{{Infobox film
| name = Remember Me
| image = Remember me film poster.jpg
| border = yes
| caption = Theatrical release poster
| alt =
| director = Allen Coulter
| writer = Will Fetters
| producer =
| starring =
| cinematography = Jonathan Freeman
| editing = Andrew Mondshein
| music = Marcelo Zarvos
| studio = Underground Films
| distributor = Summit Entertainment
| released =
| runtime = 108 minutes
| country = United States
| language = English
| budget = $16 million
| gross = $56 million
}}
'Remember Me' is a 2010 American coming-of-age romantic drama film directed by Allen Coulter and written by Will Fetters. It stars Robert Pattinson, Emilie de Ravin, Chris Cooper, Lena Olin, and Pierce Brosnan. The film received negative reviews from critics, with much of the criticism centered on its twist ending which divided audiences.
Plot
In New York, Ally is a student at New York University (NYU), and lives with her father, Neil, a New York Police Department detective. Tyler Hawkins audits classes at NYU and works at the university bookshop. He and his sister Caroline have a strained relationship with their workaholic businessman father, Charles. One night, Tyler and his roommate Aidan get involved in somebody else's fight, and are arrested by Neil. Aidan calls Charles to bail Tyler out, but he does not stick around to have a conversation with his father. Aidan sees Neil dropping Ally off, realizing that she is his daughter. He approaches Tyler with the idea to get back at the detective by persuading him to sleep with and dump Ally. Tyler and Ally go to dinner and continue seeing each other.
After noticing a tattoo on Tyler's chest reading "Michael," Tyler reveals to Ally that his brother Michael died by suicide years ago; Ally in turn reveals that her mother was mugged and fatally shot when she was young. Aidan turns up at Tyler's apartment and meets Ally for the first time, and convinces the pair to go to a party, where Ally drinks too much. The following morning, following a confrontation between her and her father, Ally flees back to Tyler's apartment, where the pair consummate their relationship.
Caroline, a budding artist, is featured in an art show, and Tyler asks his father to attend the show. When he fails to show up, Caroline is heartbroken and Tyler confronts him in a boardroom filled with people, accusing his father of willingly distancing himself from his children to avoid feeling the pain of losing another child, and father and son come to blows. Neil's partner recognizes Tyler with Ally on a train; so Neil breaks into Tyler's apartment, finds out his initial reason for meeting Ally, and violently confronts him, which forces Tyler to confess to a distraught Ally. Aidan visits Ally at her father's home to explain that he is to blame, and Tyler is genuinely in love with her.
Caroline is bullied by classmates at a birthday party where they cut a chunk of her hair off. Ally and Aidan visit Tyler's mother's apartment, where Caroline is sobbing. Tyler accompanies his sister back to school, and following further bullying, Tyler turns violent, and ends up in custody. Charles is impressed that Tyler stood up for his sister, and they connect. Charles asks Tyler to meet his lawyers at his office.
Tyler spends the night with Ally, and they confess their true love for each other. The next morning, Charles calls Tyler to let him know that he will be late, as he is taking Caroline to school; Tyler is happy that Charles is spending time with his daughter, and tells him that he will wait in his office. He looks on Charles's computer, featuring a slideshow of pictures with Tyler, Michael, and Caroline when they were younger. Caroline arrives at her classroom, where the teacher writes the date on the blackboard as Tuesday, September 11, 2001. Tyler looks out the window of his father's office, which is revealed to be located on the 101st floor of the North Tower of the World Trade Center.
A voice-over of Tyler's diary reveals that he loved Michael all along, and he forgives him for killing himself. Tyler is buried next to Michael. Some time later, Caroline and Charles seem to have a healthy father-daughter relationship. Aidan, who has since gotten a tattoo of Tyler's name on his arm, is working hard in school, and Ally gets on the subway at the same spot where her mother was killed.
Cast
* Robert Pattinson as Tyler Hawkins
* Emilie de Ravin as Alyssa "Ally" Craig
* Chris Cooper as Sgt. Neil Craig, Ally's father, an NYPD detective
* Lena Olin as Diane Hirsch, Tyler and Caroline's mother
* Tate Ellington as Aidan Hall, Tyler's roommate and best friend
* Ruby Jerins as Caroline Hawkins, Tyler's younger sister
* Pierce Brosnan as Charles Hawkins, Tyler and Caroline's father
* Peyton List as Samantha, a girl from Caroline's school who constantly bullies her.
* Kate Burton as Janine, Charles' executive assistant
* Gregory Jbara as Les Hirsch, Diane's new partner
Premiere
The film premiered on March 1, 2010, at the Paris Theatre in New York City, and received its wide release on March 12, 2010. It is rated 12A in the UK and PG-13 in the United States.
Home media
Summit Entertainment announced the DVD and Blu-ray release of June 22, 2010.
Reception
Critical response
Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 26% of 140 critics gave the film a positive review, with an average rating of 4.5/10. The site's critics consensus reads, "Its leads are likeable, but 'Remember Me' suffers from an overly maudlin script and a borderline offensive final twist." Metacritic gives it a weighted average score of 40 out of 100, based on 29 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[https://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/rememberme Remember Me Reviews, Ratings, Credits]. 'Metacritic'. Retrieved 2010-11-25. Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale.Todd McCarthy gave the film a mixed review in 'Variety', writing "The modestly scaled film delivers some moving and affecting moments amid a preponderance of scenes of frequently annoying people behaving badly." Andrea Gronvall gave a similar assessment in 'The Chicago Reader', writing "Allen Coulter directed this morose and sluggish drama, which gets more mileage from Pattinson's anguished profile than from Will Fetters's thunderously overwritten screenplay." Derek Malcolm wrote in the 'London Evening Standard', "Decently shot and directed as it is, it lacks any real flame." Kirk Honeycutt of 'The Hollywood Reporter' gave the film a positive review, stating the "scenes between Pattinson and de Ravin exude genuine charm." Honeycutt goes on to say that the score and cinematography brought "notable sparkle to this heartfelt drama."
Jake Coyle of The Associated Press did not favor the film and said the "most pleasing thing about [the film] is its boldness. It may be affected, but [it] is at least aiming for an intriguing character study a positive sign in the young career of Pattinson," who he says steps away from "'Twilight', apparently in search of his 'Five Easy Pieces' or 'Rebel Without a Cause'." Lisa Schwarzbaum of 'Entertainment Weekly' gave the film a D+, calling it a "shameless contraption of ridiculously sad things befalling attractive people." Schwarzbaum was also critical of Pattinson's acting and the script. Wesley Morris of the 'Boston Globe' gave the film a half star out of four, commenting that the film "crassly repurposes tragedy to excuse its cliches."
Several critics also found the movie's invocation of the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center offensive and exploitative, such as Lisa Kennedy of the 'Denver Post', who wrote, "The finale manages to be tasteful and exploitative at the same time. It touts forgiveness while being mildly infuriating. Such is the danger of borrowing from the enormous to merely entertain. If that. Forgettable should be the last thing a movie touching on the events of 9/11 should be. Yet 'Remember Me' is just that." Elizabeth Weitzman of 'The New York Daily News' also denounced the film's ending, writing, "There's no shame in exploring tragedy through art. But exploiting it to make your very ordinary movie feel more important? That's another story."
Roger Ebert generally liked the film, giving it three out of four stars and characterizing it as a "well-made movie. I cared about the characters. I felt for them. Liberate them from the plot's destiny, which is an anvil around their necks, and you might have something" but goes on to say it "tries to borrow profound meaning, but succeeds only in upstaging itself so overwhelmingly that its characters become irrelevant".
Box office
'Remember Me' opened in fifth place, behind 'Alice in Wonderland', 'Green Zone', 'She's Out of My League', and 'Shutter Island'. It grossed $8,089,139 in its first weekend. As of July 6, 'Remember Me' accumulated a total of $56,032,889 at the box office.Accolades
Soundtrack
The official 'Remember Me' soundtrack album was released on March 9, 2010. An album of the score composed by Marcelo Zarvos was also released. The movie contained 26 credited songs, while the soundtrack album contained 14 of them, including songs by Sigur Rs, The Beta Band, Ani Difranco, Supergrass and National Skyline. An Indian/Pakistani song, "Saason ki Mala Peh Simroon" by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, is also heard in the movie when Tyler takes Ally on their first date at Gandhi Restaurant.
References
Buy Remember Me (2010 film) now from Amazon
<-- Return to movies from 2010