My Sister's Keeper

I can hardly put into words what a disappointment that movie was. Honestly. I keep trying to say something, but it sounds more like, "seriously! just...gah!" Not exactly what you'd refer to as a balanced movie review. But here goes. I'm giving it a shot.

Warning: Spoilers

I read the book MSK earlier this year while on a plane ride to a foreign country. It was the only thing I had to read and as a result, I read it 8 or 9 times over the course of the week. I got to know the characters and I understood their reasons for doing what they did.

I saw the movie MSK earlier this afternoon on a whim with my mom. It was simply awful. Let me count the ways.

1) Jesse. (These aren't in order of awfulness).
In the book, Jesse Fitzgerald was a lost young man; a smoker, a drinker, and an arsonist. Forgotten by parents obsessed with the well-being of his younger sister, he turned to other means for acceptance. Several stories in the book stood out to me.

Once, when Jesse was 12, his family was at the hospital with Kate on Christmas Eve and he was sent to the neighbor's. Finally tired of the sidelong glances and whispers, he returned home. All by himself, he cut down a little tree in the front yard, dragged it inside, set it up, and decorated it. He even got presents the next morning. Excited that he hadn't been forgotten after all, he opened them. Every last one was from the hotel gift shop.

Another time, when he was in ninth grade, he blew up the school's septic tank. On the way home, his mom noticed bruises on the insides of his arms. She asks what they are, thinking he's doing heroin. His response? "Yeah, Ma, I'm shooting up every three days. Except I'm not doing smack, I'm getting blood taken out of me on the third floor. Didn't you wonder who else was keeping Kate in platelets?"
Forgotten once again.

To be honest, I loved the book Jesse. As messed up as that kid was, I really felt an emotional connection with him. I could tell why he did what he did. (Which is not to say, Mom, that I'm going to go set things on fire because Kepler needs you more than I do sometimes.)

Near the end of the book, Jesse's father (a firefighter) puts out one of the fires his son has set and confronts him at home. But it's not a scene of blame. It's a scene of reconciliation. It's Brian's apology for all the times he's left Jesse behind to care for Kate. It's not "Jesse, you're horrible," it's "Jesse, I'm so sorry I did this to you."

Movie Jesse.
Good God.
Silent, in the background, tortured artist kind of kid. Involved with his family. Smiles occasionally. Joins them for dinner every night. Cleans himself up in the end. WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG.
Were it not for the fact that they threw his little drawings in there from time to time, Movie Jesse would have faded into the background entirely. And I hated that. The dynamics his character had with Anna and Kate and Brian and Sara and Julia (we'll get to THAT subject) were completely lost. It was like the director said, "Well, I don't want this to be rated R, so we'll skip the 18 year old drinking, smoking, stealing dumptrucks, setting things on fire, and CARING ABOUT HIS SISTERS...but he has to be in there somewhere, so we'll use Evan Ellingson (who did a good job with what he had), and oh, let's make him an artist so he's not TOO bland."

Great job there, director man.

Y'know, there's one scene with Jesse in the book where he sets this little "abandoned" shack on fire and then finds out there's a homeless guy living in it. You know what he does? Dives back into that fire and gets the guy out. He's gotten so entrenched in his rebel, attention-desiring lifestyle that he forgets who he really is until someone needs him.

Enough about Jesse. Though, little side note: That's one of my favorite boy names of all time.

Oh, where to go from there? Julia, I suppose.

Julia Romano. Of course, I can't speak of the movie Julia because there wasn't one. But book Julia. Oh, she was amazing.
There was this whole back story with her and Campbell Alexander (Anna's attorney) about when they were high school and in love. He broke up with her right before graduation and they've been apart for twenty years, but they never really lose the feelings. She thinks he dumped her because he came from a high-class family and she had pink hair and wore combat boots and his parents disapproved. In reality, he left her because he was an epileptic and didn't want to tell her.
They meet again in the book when she is assigned to his case as guardian ad litem for Anna. There's a night...you know the kind. They're on his boat and the stars are out and it all goes from there. Her wanting Campbell back but hating him and his wanting her back despite that is such a good way to make him actually human, to improve his character as one of the main players.
Also, Julia talks to everyone. It's her job. Her conversations with them develop their characters as well as hers.
Then there's the question of her using her power in the courtroom to reject Campbell and mess up his case because of their past or doing what's right for Anna like she's been hired to do and ending up on Campbell's side. The tension, the internal struggle...though she's kind of a side character, she's an intentional, well-developed character.
And she wasn't in the movie at all. We lost all those glances into the past. We lost Campbell's being slightly human. We lost that internal struggle. We lost a side character who was still vital to the story being complete.

On a quick acting note here, before I get to Taylor. Cameron Diaz was not good enough (though she is a talented woman) to really show all the nuances of Sara's obsession keeping Kate alive. It was too one dimensional. She was blind. She couldn't understand anything beyond what she wanted to understand. But in the book, it's played all the way through Sara's character. Sara's the mom, btw.

Y'know what, I'm just going to get right into that.

There's a scene in the book where Brian (the father) is remembering what Sara was like when they met and got married. They took a road-trip at one point and meet a psychic when they stop to get gas. I'll just put in the passage here.

"Madame Agnes was the kind of blind that scares children, with cataract eyes that looked like an empty blue sky. She put her knobby hands on Sara's face to read her bones and said that she saw three babies and a long life but it wouldn't be enough. What's that supposed to mean? Sara asked, incensed, and Madame Agnes explained that fortunes were like clay and could be reshaped. But you could only remake your own future, not anyone else's, and for some people that just wasn't good enough."

That's Sara. I can't say anything more than that.

Anna. The details were tiny with her. Like, in the book, she's 13 instead of 11. She plays hockey. That was just a LITTLE bit crucial. She has a REASON to not want give her kidney up. She plays hockey and she's good at it. She gets invited, full scholarship, to a hockey camp run by the goalie of the women's USA team. She has a boyfriend, kind of. Anna's character in the movie, though I do like Abigail Breslin, was as one dimensional as Sara's. There wasn't nearly enough about HER. I can understand wanting to cater to a culture that used to everything NOW, but why sacrifice the quality of the movie to that extent?

Taylor. My favorite part of the book. They ruined it. RUINED.
He was such a sweetie in the book. He strikes up a conversation with this girl next to him. They end up together. He takes her to the prom for sick kids at the hospital. There's this scene that I love so much (reminds me of my first kiss, minus all the talk about funerals and stuff) where Taylor takes Kate out to this courtyard during the prom. There's lights up and everything..the moon and stars are out..it's perfect. They love each other. You can tell. There's a kiss. It's perfect. But that night, he dies. It's over just as it was getting better.

Movie Taylor.
Kate starts the conversation. Their first kiss is this makeout session on the front porch after she tells him she's relapsed and has to start chemo next week. There's no "So what was it like?" "Flying. I bet it feels just the same way."
They go to prom (I don't want to talk about the picture-taking scene. It just pissed me off). But that special place he takes her after? Not the courtyard! Oh no! Heaven forbid your daughter should have a night of innocence with the boy she loves! They go do it. In some hospital bed somewhere off in the hospital and then they lie there naked, bald, the moon coming in through the window. It hurt. It physically hurt me. I didn't want them to go there. It wasn't right for the character of Kate or for Taylor! Though he did die that night. That was one of the worst parts of the movie for me.


Now, for the ending. That was the worst part. Kate dies. Not only does she die, she dies comforting her mother who has finally come to the realization that her daughter is NOT going to "stay strong for surgery" but is in fact going to leave her. That night.

But in the book...oh, the book. At the end of the book, Campbell wins his case petitioning for Anna's rights to her own body and on his way to take her home, they're in a car accident. He lives, but Anna hits her head on the window and sustains fatal brain damage. Kate gets the kidney after all. She lives. Anna fulfills her purpose. She was born to save her sister and save her sister she did.

But what was her purpose in the movie?
What was the point of the battle? The victory? Kate's dead. Who cares if Anna has medical emancipation now?

In the movie, it's all a happy ending at the end. Sara goes back into law practice. Jesse goes back to school and gets a scholarship to some highfalutin' art school somewhere. Every year on Kate's birthday, they go to Montana (she always wanted to go to Montana...why? Never explained).

In the book, Sara stays Sara. Brian "falls deep into the bottle and has to claw his way out." Jesse cleans up, yes, and goes to the police academy. But, you see, in that case it makes sense with his character. Underneath all the pain and rebellion, he just wanted to be loved again. Kate teaches dance and remembers Anna forever.

There were other, meaningless details that changed the movie from the book, but, like I said, they're meaningless.

The best acting in that movie was done by Sofia Vassilieva, the young lady who played Kate. She was phenomenal.

But the bottom line is that they had so much to work with with My Sister's Keeper. The characters, their struggles and victories, their motives...and it was a flop. I'm sure some people will love it. Some people will sob their little hearts out about how touching it was. But if you want a good story, read the book. Please.