Sara Gruen's 2006 novel "Water for Elephants," which I happen to have read for a Bowdoin English class, beckons like a book that comes ready-made for the transition from page to screen.
The story is told as a series of memories from Jacob Jankowski (Robert Pattinson), an old man living in a nursing home reminiscing about the days he worked in the traveling circus of The Benzini Brothers. The plot of the novel emerges from these memories, and depicts a young Jankowski who lives through the Great Depression era and loses both his parents in a car accident. He then drops out of Cornell University and joins the circus as a veterinarian.
Along the way Jankowski develops a relationship with one of the circus' star performers, Marlena (Reese Witherspoon), who also happens to be the wife of August, the head trainer. The film, directed by Francis Lawrence, chooses to focus on this one romantic aspect of the multi-layered novel, and consequently loses some of the original book's nuance and substance.
A large part of the novel's attraction rests on the character of August, who is charismatic but has a volatile and cruel temper. In Lawrence's film, this essential character is played by Christoph Waltz (whom you might remember from his Oscar-winning performance as Colonel Hans Landa in 2009's "Inglorious Basterds").
Though Waltz's performance in this film shows sparks of the ferocity that he brought to Colonel Landa, the film shies away from this character's most intense side, turning the film into more of a Hollywood romance story between Jacob and Marlena than the quirky and enthralling circus period piece that it could have been. The few moments in which August's temper is allowed to shine are the most compelling of the film.
Neither Witherspoon nor Pattinson wreck their performance, but neither is a standout. Witherspoon, playing the platinum blonde female lead, is watered down and distant, and Pattinson is reserved and unremarkable as Jacob. But the real problem is that despite the story's romantic plot-line, no sparks fly between Witherspoon and Pattinson. Their chemistry is non-existent, and even their one sex scene is transient, barely visible and yawn-inducing.
The film's musical score, which would one would assume to be an essential part for a circus film, is put into the hands of James Newton Howard, who is known more for composing action-packed scores for films like "Salt," "The Dark Night" and "The Last Airbender" than romantic and saccharine period pieces. The bold and shapeless score is so vague that it could have been taken straight from any other romantic drama.
The novel has a large cast of characters, and it develops each character in detail in ways that only a book can. Lawrence's film should have added more supporting characters. Instead, it attempts to frantically cram the protagonists into the equation and loses some of the novel's most important characters.
The films' cinematography also seems like a missed opportunity. Any film set on a train runs the risk of looking exactly like every other train movie, and "Water for Elephants" falls into this trap of failing to reinvent a hackneyed genre. The circus train like that of the Benzini Brothers' Travelling Circus, should look much different than a normal one, and this one doesn't. The brutal hierarchy of the train's socially-segregated cars, which the novel emphasizes, is lost on the film.
Ultimately, the film attempts to dazzle with Hollywood glimmer rather than the natural wonder that comes from the circus. The resulting film is vapid, relying on plot rather than delving into the personal details that made Gruen's novel special.