Must See Movie...

Highly Overrated But Still Good

This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

Taking nothing away from Geoffrey Rush's inspired performance, I thought it curious that he won a Best Actor Oscar for his role considering he was only in the picture for the second half. Of the other contenders in the category that year, I thought Billy Bob Thornton ("Sling Blade") might have done a better job with a similar portrayal of a mentally challenged individual. The frustrating thing to see in the story is how David Helfgott's father (Armin Mueller-Stahl) couldn't or wouldn't understand that the overbearing attitude toward his son was causing him to retreat inward and become more and more anti-social. At least David (Rush) had the initial courage to break away from his family for all the right reasons to pursue his one true calling. As a child prodigy, David appeared to handle his defeats rather competently, but driven as his father was to keep him at home provided very little compassion and eventually led to his becoming an emotional cripple. Not knowing how much of the story was based on actual fact, it was encouraging to see how David managed to overcome his adversity and find some sense of consolation in returning to his music and finding love with Gillian (Lynn Redgrave). Or maybe it was the other way around, as Gillian showed more of a motherly instinct and understanding of the inwardly tormented pianist. As I say, Geoffrey Rush's performance was outstanding while he was in the picture, though it wouldn't hurt to give some recognition to the two fine young actors who portrayed him at an earlier age - Alex Rafalowicz as the young boy, and Noah Taylor as the adolescent david Helfgott. Both did a commendable job as well.

To everyone who has seen SHINE and/or read Gillian Helfgott's book: If you really care about being fully informed, you need to read Margaret Helfgott's book OUT OF TUNE: DAVID HELFGOTT AND THE MYTH OF SHINE.

Shine is a great movie with a very well developed storyline and a stellar cast. It's an uplifting story about a talented pianist who lost it all after suffering for an extreme mental breakdown, it's really inspiring to see someone get back on their feet and become a better person than they ever were before, it makes you feel confident about yourself, and what you have achieved, I love a movie that can do that to their audience. I did feel there were far too many piano sequences, it was certainly necessary to show David playing, but we did not need that much long takes, they are powerful at first, tiresome after a while. The cast is magnificent, Geoffrey Rush shines, as he always does, delivering a well deserved Oscar winning performance, his best scenes are with Armin Mueller-Stahl, the chemistry between them is very strong, bringing great passion to their roles. An engaging, uplifting story, Shine is a winner and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a good drama or biography film. A gifted pianist suffers a mental breakdown that derails his career. Best Performance: Geoffrey Rush

Shine is a very famous movie here in South Australia because it was made by one of our own about one of our own. If it wasn't that this movie made a big impact in the States, earning it some academy awards, it would have sunk into obscurity. As it did go well in America, we begin to raise it to a level that it cannot really hold. Shine is a good movie, I agree with that, and yes it does deserve Academy awards, especially for the actor who played the adult David Helfgott, but I feel that us South Australians have made too much out of this movie.Shine is about David Helfgott, a child prodigy with the piano. He was taught by his father and blitzed the competitions when he was young. He was thus offered tuitions and even given the chance to train in America. Unfortunately his father would not let him. Later he is given a scholarship to study at the Royal College of Music in London, and he goes against his father's wishes and travels to London to learn. His desire to please his father leads him to perform one of the hardest pieces ever written and he ends up having a nervous breakdown which leaves him scarred for the rest of his life.The movie is about his life, but it seems that Hicks wanted to place an importance on David's relationship with his father. This should be the central point of the story. He plays the piece that his father wanted him to play and almost killed himself in the process; the movie finishes with his father's death, yet in the later part of the movie his father, and the relationship with him seems to take a back seat. There is only so much that one can do when one is creating a biography though, yet we can see that his father did have an enormous impact on his life.I call David Helfgott's father Mr Insecurity because that is what he seems to be in the movie. His major goal is the preservation of his family yet the harder he tries to stick it together the further he pushes it apart. When he sees the children beginning to fight over a letter from David's host parents to be in America, he decides that he does not want David to go. This is not the beginning as you can see his displeasure from father go further back. He dislikes the upper class company that David will no doubt start keeping and fears that he will reject his father, who is from the poorer side of society. His father knows his status and is scared that he will loose his son, but he manifests his fears when David demands to go to London, and his father lashes out and disowns his child. Thus instead of keeping the family together, he tears it apart even further.Shine, I think, is an average movie. It does deal with real people going through real things, and Scott Hicks definitely has a talent in creating movies, but I do not think that this movie is really worth all of the praise that people gave it. The only reason it is praised because it is a movie filmed in South Australia that made it to Hollywood.