Review: 127 Hours

Fox Searchlight Pictures

Let's face it, everyone knows what's going to happen at the end of this movie. We've all heard the story of climber/biker/outdoors adventurer Aron Ralston (played by James Franco) at least once and know the guy got his arm stuck under a rock and after the amount of hours mentioned in the title finally decides to cut his arm off. Now how many of us can seriously say we'd be able to do that? The man had to first break his arm in such a way as to be sure the bone was completely broken in half because there was no way his completely dull knife was going to be able to cut through bone. He then proceeds to hack and saw away through tendons and at one point snipping the main nerve that runs through his arm *barf*. 

Knowing all this, why would seeing a movie recounting this horrific event sound appealing at all? For one, director Danny Boyle ('Slumdog Millionaire', '28 Days Later', 'Trainspotting') can do no wrong (most of the time). Secondly, seeing exactly how one would go about making a 94 minute film out of this was what got me to see it. It's one of those cases where one actor (Franco) has to entertain an audience and keep the story going all on his lonesome. 

We've all seen movies like this before in the likes of Tom Hanks in 'Castaway' and even Will Smith to an extent in 'I Am Legend.' But unlike 'Castaway' and 'I Am Legend', Franco's character CAN'T MOVE. Hanks entertains us with Wilson the volleyball and lots of other things and Smith fights vampires. Franco just sits there. It's interesting to see how Aron Ralston was actually a pretty smart guy despite not having common sense enough to leave a note behind to tell anyone where he had gone. He handles the situation fairly well at first in how he rations water and the ways he goes about keeping warm and all that. Still, it's like watching one of those survival documentaries (think 'Touching the Void') except with no narration from the real person.

Fox Searchlight Pictures

And overall, it is quite intense. Of course, I was just waiting for him to start slashing away at his arm at any moment. It's really oddly comparable to how you wait for the killer in a horror movie to finally pop out and start killing everybody. So really it's just waiting for the inevitable and everything else can feel a bit slow at times. Still, for what little happens until that point, it's impressive how intense it still is.

The most interesting part to me was the staging of the story. The beginning credits start with random clips from places all over the world of people just going about their normal day. Crowds getting on and off subways, buses, and people on phones, all separate frames on screen. In the middle a frame of Ralston pops up showing him getting ready to embark on his desert adventure. And at the end, we get the same treatment of frames. But towards the end of the movie, a voice-over from Ralston, as a sort of self-reflection, explains how every moment, every little decision he had made in his life had lead him to this point.

Fox Searchlight Pictures

This statement explains the frames at the beginning and end. Life begins as normal every morning and continues every day before a catastrophe like the one that befalls Ralston. At one point, he even settles down in the canyon where he's trapped, expecting die. But after he overcomes his hopelessness and finally gets out and we see the real Aron Ralston at the end and the frames like the ones at the beginning, we understand like Ralston that every day and moment leads to what may be a horrific event, but that doesn't mean we have to give up. Because after all, every moment may have lead to this event just so we can overcome it.

It is this final message and arch of the story that really made the movie for me. Franco's performance was good, probably his best yet, and is the feature of the movie that's receiving the most praise and award nominations. But there's no doubt that his performance and the rest of the movie wouldn't have been as good without the staging and direction of the plot. Boyle and writer Simon Beaufoy (who co-wrote 'Slumdog Millionaire') took up quite the challenge when they chose this story but I don't think anyone could've have done it more justice.