Spectacular visuals, brilliant animals, a use of 3D which is almost convincing (but final proof that the effect is a barrier to immersion). Fine. But, ultimately, Pi is deeply insulting to the natural world it works so hard to depict so well. Firstly; faux spirituality – a ‘have your cake and eat it’ approach to religion (Muslim, Hindu, and Christian?), a gawping Westerner finding faith by staring at the mandalas and tealights of India – that country where we eat, pray and love our way to enlightenment. Then; the beautiful, brutal, astounding tiger, but, hey, not as good as God or faith right? Extend its tale; captured, entrapped in a zoo, fed goat for spectacle, shipwrecked, ‘tamed’, forced to survive, emaciated and left to die in a foreign jungle. And all we humans, and by extension our God, can think is; wah wah; will it look back at us or not?
Lie Life of Pi . 2012 . Ang Lee
Reviewed by Screen150
Screen150 