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Product Description
School teacher Eugene Simonet (Kevin Spacey) sets his class an
assignment: they must each think up a way to make the world a
better place. This prompts eleven-year-old Trevor McKinney (Haley
Joel Osment) to develop the idea that instead of paying back good
deeds, one should instead pay them forward. Putting his idea into
practice, Trevor performs an act of kindness for three different
people, requiring each of those three to perform three further
kindnesses themselves. In doing so he starts a chain reaction
which does indeed make the world a better place.
From Amazon.co.uk
Director Mimi Leder's third movie,
Pay it Forward, finds her moving into softer, more intimate
territory after making her name with a pair of high-budget action
spectaculars,
The Peacemaker and
Deep Impact. This is a would-be heart-warming fable about the
power of human kindness, but it's handled with such heavy
sententiousness as to suggest that she might do better sticking
to the big-bang stuff. Haley Joel Osment (
,
A.I.), son of a struggling lone parent (Helen Hunt) in Las Vegas,
is influenced by inspirational teacher Kevin Spacey to come up
with a scheme for social betterment: do acts of benevolence to
three people, each of whom then does something good for three
more, and so on. Inevitably, the lad's first ventures come to
grief, but then the idea starts catching on and spreading, and a
reporter in Los Angeles gets wind of it. This
Readers Digest-ish scenario, treated with great solemnity by
Leder and screenwriter Leslie Dixon, leaves the cast struggling
to make something individual out of their pre-cooked roles. As
you'd expect given such a line-up of acting talent, several
scenes come off better than they deserve, and Spacey in
particular does wonders with what is, in effect, two Hollywood
clichés rolled into one: not just "offbeat inspirational teacher"
but "shy, reclusive burns victim" as well. Interesting, too, to
see a Vegas-set movie that shows a low-rent side of the city well
away from the glitz and glamour of the Strip. But in the end, all
else is drowned out by the clatter of predetermined plot-points
being hammered home.
On the DVD: Extras include a commentary from Leder, and a
13-minute "making-of" documentary that includes cast and director
interviews. None of it, though, tells us much we couldn't have
gathered from the movie. The clean widescreen (1.85:1) print and
the Dolby 5.1 sound deliver on quality, and come fully into their
own in the all-out bravura finale--shameless tear-jerking on a
grand scale. --Philip Kemp
Synopsis
Social studies teacher Eugene Simonet (Kevin Spacey) gives his
class anassignment: come up with an idea that will change the
world. Eleven year old Trevor comes up with a revolutionary idea:
Instead of paying a favour back, his idea is to pay three new
people a favour, thus changing the lives of all around him.
From the Back Cover
Tormented by an abusive and absent father (Jon Bon Jovi), young
Trevor McKinney (Haley Joel Osment -
The Sixth Sense) takes his teacher's (Kevin Spacey) challenge, to
make the world a better place as part of a school assignment,
seriously. He comes up with an idea whereby instead of paying
back good deeds, they are paid forward, by helping other people.
The Pay It Forward system has massive repercussions transforming
the lives of, amongst others, his alcoholic mother (Helen Hunt),
struggling to support and raise her son, and his teacher, as they
are forced to deal with their painful pasts. Their cult is both
devastating and heart warming.
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