The Lovely Bones

The FILM

Synopsis (Book):

The Lovely Bones is the story of a family devastated by a gruesome murder -- a murder recounted by the teenage victim. Upsetting, you say? Remarkably, first-time novelist Alice Sebold takes this difficult material and delivers a compelling and accomplished exploration of a fractured family's need for peace and closure.

The details of the crime are laid out in the first few pages: from her vantage point in heaven, Susie Salmon describes how she was confronted by the murderer one December afternoon on her way home from school. Lured into an underground hiding place, she was raped and killed. But what the reader knows, her family does not. Anxiously, we keep vigil with Susie, aching for her grieving family, desperate for the killer to be found and punished. (Goodreads)

The Lovely Bones 2009 movie had a power house casting led by the great Susan Sarandon (Grandma Lynn), Mark Wahlberg (Jack Salmon), Rachel Weisz (Abigail Salmon) and Sairose Ronan (Susie Salmon) whom I recognized later from the movie "Hannah."

The BOOK

This was actually based on the very first novel of author Alice Sebold who took on a quite difficult material for her first book. I haven't read the book but I watched the film mainly because of the great actors included in the cast.

It's a family drama with lots of suspense. I had a hard time guessing who the murderer was (that's because I haven't read the book because if I did, then I would've known who did it right from the start). And then I found out it was him and then I start guessing where he might've hidden the body. You won't actually find out until the very later part of the movie.

The movie is actually depressing when you think of a family going through a situation like what the Salmon's went through in the movie. It's really devastating to loose a child through rape and kidnapping at such a young age when she's just starting to experience things. Sigh.... Well, it got me just a bit teary eyed. 

Here are some lines from the movie:

"I was slipping away, that's what it felt like, life was leaving me, but I wasn't afraid; then I remembered: "There was something I was meant to do; somewhere I was meant to be." - Susie Salmon

"Nobody notices when we leave. I mean, the moment when we really choose to go. At best you might feel, a whisper or the wave of a whisper, undulating down." - Susie Salmon

"I was here for a moment, and then I was gone. I wish you all, a long, happy life." - Susie Salmon