review by Joseph B. Mauceri

SYNOPSIS: Bobby Garfield's past catches up with him when the death of a childhood friend brings him back to the town of his youth. A memento connected to that death and additional tragic news transports Garfield back to the summer of 1960.

It's Bobby's 11th summer, one filled with a friendship shared with his closest pals, Carol and Sully. It is the summer that brings a new arrival in all their lives, Ted Brautigan. Lurking In the upstairs apartment where Bobby lives, Ted fills the gap left by his father, offering him friendship and helping to open the boy's eyes to a bigger world. However, his mother, Liz, clouds Bobby's memory of his dead father with bitterness. Ted also brings with him a haunted past, and a mysterious strange powers. He offers Bobby a job, it's more than simply reading the paper. Ted asks him to keep an eye out for signs for "dangerous" men that are pursuing him.

It is a summer of revelations, dark shadows and hope. It is the final summer of Bobby's childhood and innocence. It is a journey into the past that leads the adult Bobby Garfield full circle, and home again.
 

REVIEW: I am biased. When I first read King's story I was weeping as the elements hearken back to my own childhood. Still, what seized my heart was King's characterization of Ted Brautigan. Here was a man with a silent strength and tenderness that reminded me of my maternal grandfather.

At the beginning of the summer I had the pleasure to be invited by Warner Bros. to attend their ShoWest reel screening. Among the trailers was one for HEARTS IN ATLANTIS. Seeing Anthony Hopkins dressed in costume and in character opened a portal that felt as if space and time had collapsed for a brief moment to grant me a glimpse into my own childhood. It was the first time a trailer made me cry, and I knew at once something special was going to happen with this film.

I will tell you that watching HEARTS IN ATLANTIS was the most devastating cinematic experience of my career. From the unfiltered cigarettes, to the appreciation of literature, listening to the radio and reading the paper, here where moments from my own childhood that I shared with my own grandfather. They were those simple, yet defining moments that shape our lives and seal our fate.

Scott Hicks takes a simple tale and finds his own magic in it, allowing a large portion of that spell to radiate through his superb cast. Cinematically, Hicks is able to capture magical King moments and characterizations due to Goldman's exceptional adaptation. Hicks contemporary scenes are brooding, but takes his cinematic queue from more classic films for young Bobby's story, at times a glimpse of an American landscape that mirrors "The Grapes of Wrath," or Billy Wilde's "It's a Wonderful Life."  Anthony Hopkins is as always award worthy, but is rivaled by his young co-star Anton Yelchin. There is a scene in the film when Bobby and his friends are confront by some older boys from the local parochial school and they are rescued by Ted. There was a power and sequencing to the scene that was reminded me of "To Kill a Mocking Bird."

Given them complexity and plotting of King's original tale, Bill Goldman once again proves his uncanny skill of dissecting the fat from the prose to create a screenplay to rival King's work. There are two other great tales in the novel that involves Bobby Garfield, but Goldman is able to successfully isolate this tale from the rest. He does tip his hat to the King fans by offering a few references of those narratives within the present scenes. Gone are the references to the novel Lord of the Files, as well as King's use of images that draw from the universe he created with The Dark Tower series. However, they are not missed. Goldman shows use that the true magic of King's tale lies within his characters and is simply a direct result of the human condition.

HEARTS IN ATLANTIS is a magical film that transports us back to a simpler time. It is a period when the monsters kept to the shadows, or hid in the closet, but they were present and just as brutal. It was a time when heroes were valiant, and could be found living right up stairs. And magic was still possible. There once was a period in our country's history when children could shed the innocence like a butterfly emerging from a cocoon. It may not be "Camelot," but HEARTS IN ATLANTIS is about the magic and triumph of the love when two strangers reach out to each other. HEARTS IN ATALNATIS earns its place among "Stand by Me," "Dolores Claiborne" and "The Green Mile.

OFFICIAL WEB SITE:
http://www2.warnerbros.com/heartsinatlantis

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