Extremely Loud, Incredibly Close

Director: Stephen Daldry

Writer: Jonathan Safran Foer

Producer: Nora Skinner

Casts: Tom Hanks, Sandra Bullock, Thomas Horn, Max Von Sydow

Actually I have put this bestselling debut novel written by Jonathan Safran Foer in my wish list but out of the blue I just got the DVD first.  Since the urge to watch it was unbearable, I finally watched the film first instead of read the book *sigh*. Fortunately I still find the movie is good.  I guess a story with 9/11 background will always be something. This movie also brings the 9/11 issue and it's narrated from a 9-year-old boy, Oskar Schell. Oskar's father dies in the terrorist attack on World Trade Center  on September 11, 2001. Oskar is very close to his father. They have a special relationship. No wonder when his father passes away, Oskar is in a deep mourning. He claims that the 9/11 day as the worst day ever.

A year after his father's death, Oskar finally enters his father's room and looks into his father's wardrobe and accidentaly discovers a key in a vase that belonged to his father. Curious about this key and he thought that it could bring him to his father's last message, Oskar searchs around New York for information about the key. On his journey he meets a lot of people and learns about himself and his family. He begins to uncover the unseen link to the father he misses, to the mother who seems so far away from him and to the whole noisy, and dangerous world around him.  

It's hard to believe that such a sad story could be so entertaining. It's a story about trauma, mourning. and struggle between self-destruction and self-preservation. A must see movie!