In the 1970s, Cameron Crowe was the Shirley Temple of American rock culture: the cute, wholesome kid who hung out with the idols of excess and never got corrupted. He has always been too clean-cut to be considered cool, both as a teenage rock journalist for Rolling Stone and as the film-maker behind hits such as Jerry Maguire and Almost Famous. (His official website is actually called The Uncool.) What he lacked in cool, though, he made up for in boyish charm that hid a steely determination.
Being the youngest guy in the room was crucial to Crowe’s success. It made whatever he did seem remarkable, even when, like his rock journalism, it was just okay. Nowadays, Crowe is 54 and looks like Jonathan Ross after a failed sex change. Since the critical and commercial flop of his last feature film, Elizabethtown (2005), he has been making music docs, including one about the musical collaboration between Elton John and Leon Russell. Clearly, this is a man in need of a hit.
For his comeback, he has chosen We Bought a Zoo, a family-friendly weepie based on a true story. The Guardian journalist Benjamin Mee was living in the south of France when he felt the need to change his life. Most life-changers flee England for the south of France, but Mee not only went the other way, he bought a run-down zoo in Devon, with 200 animals, and moved in. (How a Guardian journalist could afford a teepee in outer Mongolia, much less a large zoo in Devon, is a mystery the film doesn’t grapple with.) It was there that his wife died of cancer, leaving Mee with two small children to look after.
Like any competent hack, he must have known that such a move would make a great column/book/documentary. But I doubt he or anyone ever imagined it would make a Hollywood movie, with Matt Damon playing the bald and bearded Mee, and Scarlett Johansson as his love interest.
Look, if you want some sort of profound meditation on the human condition, stay at home. We Bought a Zoo is what it is, and that ain’t so bad. It’s not the clichéd, schmaltzy tearjerker you’d imagine, given its quota of cute kids, cute characters and cute animals. It’s a sweet and sincere film that just manages to keep the corn and cuteness under control.
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Here, Benjamin Mee (Damon) is an adventure journalist grieving over the death of his wife six months earlier. He’s trying to move on, but is stuck with his memories. So he struggles to be a strong and good dad to his angry teenage son, Dylan (Colin Ford), and his seven-year-old daughter, Rosie (Maggie Elizabeth Jones). When Dylan is expelled from school for stealing, Benjamin, who quits his job with an LA newspaper, decides it’s time to start a new life.
He finds a beautiful house in southern California. There’s only one hitch. It comes with a zoo — 200 animals, including a depressed tiger and a grumpy bear, along with a small staff of devoted keepers, led by the overworked and underpaid Kelly (Johansson).
The film, co-written by Crowe and Aline Brosh McKenna (The Devil Wears Prada), has two dramatic strands. There’s the story of the zoo’s struggle for survival. It’s due for a make-or-break inspection by the evil inspector Walter Ferris (John Higgins). The question is, does Benjamin have the right stuff to stay the course — and does he have the money to keep things running until the zoo can reopen to the public? And if he rebuilds it, will they come?
The more interesting and dramatically engaging strand is the story of a man struggling to let go and get beyond grief, and how that affects his life and relationships with others. Crowe is careful not to get too heavy or solemn, and finds room for laughs. The film is at its best when it focuses on the troubled relationship between father and son: Dylan loathes being at the zoo and is convinced his dad hates him. Crowe captures the mix of anger and hurt that both son and father feel.
The movie has plenty of faults. The zoo story line is totally predictable — but then so was the ending of Melancholia. The whole evil-zoo-inspector story line is trite and the zoo staff are a touch too zany. Music has always been important in Crowe’s films, but here his choices seem odd. Why Neil Young’s Cinnamon Girl when we see all the zoo staff hard at work getting ready for the inspection?
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That said, there’s something here for all the family to enjoy. The funny animal encounters will keep the kids happy. Young teenage boys will fall for the lovely Elle Fanning as the farm girl who falls for Dylan. And while mums dream of hot sex with Matt Damon, dads can indulge in a little fantasy of their own — being the superdad who quits his job, buys a home with a zoo attached to it and becomes a hero to his children.
We Bought a Zoo
PG, 124 mins
