Coming Soon: Life of Pi

You may recall from the November edition of The Hight Five that I'm extremely excited about Ang Lee's forthcoming adaptation of Life of Pi.  The novel is breathtaking, pensive, beautiful, and surprising, somehow penetrating the question of what it means to be human more thoroughly and thoughtfully using a cast largely comprised of animals than than other novels manage with more bipedal casts.

Now, Life of Pi is less than a week away, and the Oscar buzz is already huge.  Lee won previously for Brokeback Mountain (one of my favorite movies), but he's never had a film win Best Picture.  Not Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.  Not Sense and Sensibility.  And, in one of the worst Oscar slights ever, not Brokeback Mountain.  Whether or not that will change this year is very much up in the air, which is a fun change of pace from the typical uber predictability of awards season.

Regardless of how Life of Pi fares in the major categories, it's certain to figure into the tech races.  The trailer is a visual feast, with rich splashes of color, impressive special effects, and a masterful use of space.  This is the rare movie I'm actually planning to see in 3-D, since it's exciting when a great director takes a turn with new technologies (I'm thinking Martin Scorsese taking on an extra dimension with Hugo last year).  I'm excited to see how the very internal, reflective narrative of the novel makes the transition to the big screen.  Apparently, one method being used is to focus on the vividness of the external.  More obvious, there will surely be some flashbacks, maybe fantasies, etc., a la 127 Hours.

Below are the official synopsis for the film and some behind-the-scenes photos (all photos are courtesy of Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation) below.  Click here to see the trailer.  Life of Pi releases November 21.

With LIFE OF PI, director Ang Lee (“Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”) creates a groundbreaking movie event about a young man who survives a disaster at sea and is hurtled into an epic journey of adventure and discovery. While cast away, he forms an amazing and unexpected connection with another survivor…a fearsome Bengal tiger.

(While this is a sponsored post, all the excitement and optimism is my own.)