Jack

Wtf is wrong with this world ... the ratings are just made by simple brain people who have such a pity existence.

An all-star cast are recruited together to tell the tale of a 10-year old boy whose body grows 4 times that of a normal kid his age.

Robin Williams ('Hook') is great as the title role, while Fran Drescher ('The Nanny') and Jennifer Lopez ('Money Train') are also fantastic. Bill Cosby is also here, as good as ever.

The storyline and scripting is good (nothing great) and the acting is first-class... even the kids have some talent!

A feel-good family film that has some very funny moments and some very sad moments, but all-in-all a really good film. 7/10.

Okay it's not exactly the biggest stretch of casting to have Robin Williams playing a ten year old in the body of an adult. However, Jack is a pretty decent and funny movie. Jack Powell is born and he ages at four times the normal rate. For the first ten years of his life he is tutored at home and sheltered by his parents. Bill Cosby plays his tutor Mr. Woodruff. Diane Lane and Brian Kerwin play his parents who are reluctant to send Jack to public school because they fear the other children's reactions to him. When he does go to school, his teacher, played by Jennifer Lopez, welcomes him with open arms while, predictably the kids are both awed and afraid, and teasing soon follows. Jack gains acceptance when the boys realize that he is a natural for basketball, and he soon is running with a whole group of new friends.

The rest of the movie is basically about Jack and how his body is just naturally slowing down, leading to his withdrawal from school, his eventual return, and the epilogue at his high school graduation.

Jack was a pretty charming film and I liked the way that Robin Williams acted in his scenes with Diane Lane as the 10 year old with a strong bond with his mother, and her feelings of longing when he shows that he is pulling away when he gains friends his own physical age.

Pregnant Diane Lane goes into labor after only two months, delivering a healthy-seeming baby boy (when she pleads "it's too soon!" to her husband in the delivery room, it's rather an understatement). Doctors have never seen another child like this, yet quickly determine the boy has an internal clock which is ahead of itself by four times the average rate (meaning that when Jack is 10-years old, he'll look like a man of 40). Talk about your movie gimmicks! All that aside, what we really have here is Robin Williams back in grade school, and that provides for some good, if derivative, humor. The performances are all fine and, while the set-up may sound inexcusable, "Jack" isn't a silly movie (at least, not at its core). Williams manages to hold back a bit from his usual barrage of vocal effects and facial expressions, and a few of his scenes are peddled quite softly (as they were in "Awakenings"). There are some scenes that go over-the-top: Jack's gross-talking school-friends are a nuisance, and some viewers may get defensive when Coppola starts tugging at the heartstrings. Otherwise, this is a warm family comedy, one with a bigger heart than it knows what to do with. **1/2 from ****

I was extremely surprised to find out that Francis Ford Coppola directed this film, not because it's below the standards I expect from him, but because it is really well directed. It's rare that a movie can be so well directed and so bad at the same time. It's hard to pinpoint the exact problem here, until you realize it's all in the writing: moreover, the story. Robin Williams does everything he can for this character, and the story does not reciprocate. The entire cast is a success, in fact. I generally loathe child actors, but these ones are almost believable; Jennifer Lopez nailed a lot of nuanced beats and really surprised me; Bill Cosby was incredibly endearing, despite all of his horrible crimes. The shots and storytelling behind the camera, save for a couple janky inserts, is effective. Yeah, the more I think about it, the clearer this case of bad writing becomes. Not a bad premise, but the execution is hit or miss at best and the ending is woefully dissatisfying. All I needed to know is what he wrote for that essay, but we didn't get it. What a shame.