AUGUST RUSH

REVIEWED BY CHARITY BISHOP

Our rating: 5 out of 5

Rated:

It is all about the music, and how it transcends through incomprehensible difficulties to reach our soul. That is the bottom line of August Rush, a film most critics are calling too sentimental for its own good. But like a decent song that comes along once in a lifetime, this film gets under your skin and leaves you with not only a yearning to hear the music, but an appreciation for those who lives are transformed by it.

Eleven years and sixteen days. That is how long Evan (Freddie Highmore) has been in foster care. But the fact that the other boys tease him for being a "freak" does not prevent him from daydreaming about his parents, from knowing they are out there, from being determined to find them. Blessed with a passion for music that his peers cannot understand, Evan believes that he can "hear" his mother and father across the miles, convinced the music that whispers through his soul is a stronger connection than anything that can be imagined. He knows that the music will bring them together, if only he can allow enough people to hear it. Leaving the home behind and hitching a ride in the back of a truck into New York, he is taken under the musical wing of a street musician (Robin Williams).

Twelve years earlier, a chance meeting between Lila Novacek (Keri Russell) and Louis Connelly (Jonathan Rhys Myers) budded into something like romance. If nothing else, there was a soul connection, an immediate bond that was rudely shattered the following morning when Lila's father forced her into the back of a limousine and drove her to the airport for her next concert. After the presumed loss of the baby that resulted from this magical night, Lila has given up her musical career. So has Louis. But as Evan searches for answers, his parents look for second chances, and circumstances may bring them together... or tear them further apart.

One thing about this film is that while there are predictable aspects about it, ultimately August Rush is full if miniature surprises that will touch the heart of its audience. Music flows through everything -- through the busy city streets, through the lives of the characters, through the audience. Evan's gifts are miraculous. He can compose without having learned his musical notes. Everyone around him recognizes his gifts almost immediately, and while some hope to lift him higher because of them, others seek to benefit from them. The film is not for children, because they will not understand or appreciate its deeper meaning. There is even a subtle Christian undertone in some of the scenes, because Evan stumbles into the midst of a church choir and rapidly makes friends.

If there is one weakness, it is the fact that we are asked to believe in that soulful connection between Lila and Louis -- after only one meeting. I have never believed in love at first sight and never will, so having Louis brood over a girl he spent six hours with for over ten years was a bit of a stretch for me to blindly accept. Other than that, the film was quite good. We do know that Lila and Louis slept together, but we don't see any part of the act. There is hardly any bad language (one muffled profanity that might have been GD). There is mild violence when a man shoves a little boy around, but most of the rating comes from intense thematic elements.

For the first twenty or so minutes, the film did not really captivate me and there were moments when I felt it was dragging a little too much, but after Evan fell in with Wizard and some of his street buddies, the pace picked up a lot and the characters came alive. The music in this film is absolutely phenomenal. The scenes mixing classical and rock were especially fantastic, and I defy anyone not to love the final half hour. It's not a film that everyone is going to love, but it certainly entertained and enchanted me for an afternoon, and in a world of movies full of foul language and sexual content, is a breath of fresh air. Or perhaps more accurately, a hint of music in the wind.