I love this movie one of my favorites
The thing that bothers me is Haley's character seems to be 10-11 in age (can't remember if the mention the exact age) but he is treated like and acts like a 6-7 year old. Am I the only one who noticed this?
I just think some minor rewriting would have solved this issue, a 10-11 year old I think can still holds the aura of innocence, so a recast would not be needed.
I thought he was 13-14, and what bothered me a little was that his voice broke several.....or a lot, of times in the movie. It was kinda distracting, but the movie was still good.
[Ridley Scott on why his movies don't have sex scenes] "Sex is boring unless you're doing it."
The breaking of his voice was purposeful. Notice in the end it wasn't breaking anymore. It was part of his character transformation.
shareHaley Joel Osment was going through puberty at the time he was making this movie. He wasn't making his voice crack on purpose, nature was taking it's course. It had nothing to do with his character transforming. He may be a pretty good actor, but he isn't that good.
I think he was terribly miscast in this movie. If he was supposed to be 10, there's no way Haley should have been cast. He was 15 years old when he made this movie and he looks every bit of it.
It's a great movie, though. Robert Duvall and Michael Caine made this movie fantastic.
Osment looked about 10- hell, almost ten years later, and he still barely looks fifteen.
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If you read the trivia it says he was going through puberty at the time which was the cause of his voice cracking and getting deeper at the end.
shareHe was terrible and took a lot away from an otherwise good film....
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piplh ~ The thing that bothers me is Haley's character seems to be 10-11 in age (can't remember if the mention the exact age) but he is treated like and acts like a 6-7 year old. Am I the only one who noticed this?
Do not agree with you. I figured him to be around 12 or so. And I thought that he acted very much that age.
I thought he did quite well most of the time. Clearly, Robert Duvall held down the "lion's" share of this (sorry, pun intended). Michael Caine was just fine, but Robert Duvall was great. Haley Joel Osment was okay. He was a good type to play the part. And for most of it, he was okay. Most of his acting was excessively "hammy" and overstated, though. Particularly his reactions to life on the McCann farm, the food on the table, no TV, no phone, the salesmen's reception...
The thing that REALLY bothered me and it bothered me a lot was WHY did they pick Josh Lucas to play adult Walter????? He looks absolutely NOTHING like Haley Joel Osment. Terrible choice!! The adult Walter role was very small and not too demanding, they could have picked from many other actors, why didn't they pick someone whom would bear more of a resemblance to Haley Joel Osment?? It's not like Josh Lucas brought anything that special to the part. For the most part, his part was limited to quietly reacting to the news at the end.
And another thing! If the movie is set in 1962 (marked on some of the mail) and the Walter character is around 10 - 13 years old (depending upon whom you ask) that would make the adult Walter around 50 years old, which Josh Lucas does not appear to be. That would also make the McCann's a lot older than 90, more like 105 or so.
Totally agree with this. Josh Lucas looks nothing like Osmont. I thought the days of those kinds of blatant mismatches were over. Shape of head, shape of face, features, hair...nothing matched. They could have used any half competent actor. It's strange how they go to so much trouble to achieve believability only to yank you out of the movie with such a horrible, avoidable mismatch.
Can't agree that Osmont's acting was 'hammy'. I thought he was fine all the way. But I never had the impression he was 12 or anything like it. In one shot he looked about 17, but most of the time he looked his age--15.
Wow, people. This is not that hard. The character was supposed to be around 14 and he was supposed to act a bit younger and be treated younger. In the beginning of the film they kept calling him a sissy and a weeny. It was a character he was playing, awkward, introverted, sheltered kid who is going through puberty. And tons of people don't get puberty. As a girl, it didn't happen for me until 16. His voice could easily still be cracking at 14. I didn't see him acting like a 6 yr old. I saw him acting as a shy, scared introverted kid, which is exactly what he was meant to be.
sharePuberty hits girls differently than it hits guys. That's not to say that he couldn't still be cracking at 14, but your having not hit puberty until 16 is irrelevant. Girls naturally hit puberty when their bodies are physically ready to carry children. It's why girls are looking so much older these days (the rate of overweight children, they have more body weight they go into puberty earlier) and is also the reason a lot of gymnasts don't hit puberty until 19 or 20, because they keep themselves so slender. Male puberty runs a completely different cycle (as we don't carry children).
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I think it is just you, I even watched this movie tonight and I don't remember ever at one point where he stated how old he is. Was it because of how his mom treated him, like taking him to his uncles' place where before she arrives she tells him that she is going to Fort Worth for reporting school which he does discover that she is not there. But of the minor rewriting do you think that this movie needed?
shareI rather thought that was intentional. His mother sure treated him like a little kid, not accepting he was old enough to "see" through her transparent life style. The two old codgers, at first, treated him like an annoying little kid...they also saw him younger than he was. The maturing we see is not only him changing, but them developing more respect for him and therefore starting to see him older. That coincides with his voice maturing.
His acting wasn't bad, but the mannerisms/actions of this prepubescent boy were very odd, dare I say 'giddy'? It's like when you see the 24 year old chatting up the 11 year old's at the video game store, asking if they want to meet up at his treehouse later to play Pokémon. Probably harmless, but you still have an uneasy feeling.
With the puberty taking place and the silly actions of his character, I was expecting the uncle's to catch him experimenting with the pig out in the corn fields.