Someone please tell Mr. Smith to cheer up. His recent fondness for depicting depressed characters is becoming a bit, well, depressing.  A broke and homeless single father in The Pursuit of Happyness, the last living human in I am Legend, a lonely alcoholic superhero in Hancock and now a guilt ridden miseryguts in Seven Pounds. Is life really that gloomy for one of Hollywood’s highest paid actors?

Although, unlike some of these aforementioned films, misery is just about all there is to his latest drama. If Smith’s incessantly forlorn character doesn’t weigh you down, then the monotony of the frustratingly structured and far-fetched narrative certainly will. With everything so hopeless, the only ray of light comes from the thought of the credits rolling up the screen to remind us that the despair is over. 

In this paragraph I would normally provide a brief synopsis, but divulging any actual plot detail would probably result in me giving away the entire film. At a minimum, I could tell you that it’s the story of an IRS agent by the name of Ben Thomas (Will Smith), whom mysteriously selects seven people to help tremendously as a form of redemption. Going in, that’s just about all the film wants you to know, and for nearly an hour and a half, the film takes immense pleasure in letting its audience in on nothing more. Yet this screen time feels entirely inconsequential; it acts like it’s going somewhere, but since we’re obviously not meant to really know where until the closing minutes, it might as well not have. What ailed my experience of Seven Pounds the most is that I correctly guessed the ending not 25 minutes in, but I knew that I shouldn’t have. It’s incredibly frustrating to have to sit for an hour watching on as the film tediously pieces together the puzzle, revelling in the way it thinks it still has me guessing, even though I had completed it long ago. I’d much rather have just watched the last 30 minutes of Seven Pounds and be done with all the tedium that leads up to it.

I expect some might argue that the first three quarters of the film is relevant to the development Ben’s character and the love story involving one of his list-ees Emily Posa (Rosario Dawson). Considering that the romantic sub-plot within Seven Pounds is perhaps its strongest asset, this argument has some merit. However, despite the poignancy of his last film the Pursuit of Happyness, director Gabriele Muccino isn’t able to get the most out of Smith this time around. There isn’t much beyond the surface to Smith’s portrayal of Ben; he changes from teary-eyed to pouty-lipped as expected, but never manages to make that all important connection with the audience. In fact, I found that I was more taken by Woody Harrelson’s performance as a blind telephone operator within his 5 minutes of screentime. It’s not necessarily Smith’s fault; the screenplay tends to work against any  connection being made as Ben’s endless misery coupled with his frustratingly unexplained motives make it hard to shed a tear when the emotional punches are made during the reveal.

Conclusion:

Seven Pounds is a film that you want to like, yet strangely feels as if it’s trying to make sure you don’t. The frustratingly structured and overly morose narrative fails to captivate as it never lets its audience truly connect with its central character.

[rating: 2/5]

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