'Pay it Forward' one for the believers

By Joko E.H. Anwar

Pay It Forward *** (out of ****); Starring Kevin Spacey, Helen Hunt, Haley Joel Osment, Jay Mohr, James Caviezel, Angie Dickinson, Jon Bon Jovi.; Directed by Mimi Leder A Bel Air Entertainment/Tapestry Films/Warner Bros Production.

JAKARTA (JP): This is one of those films where audiences will try hard to figure out whether the movie is genuinely touching or simply manipulative.

Cynics are likely to jump at this film as yet another Hollywood vehicle meant to milk viewers' emotions.

Whatever the filmmaker's real intentions were, many people are likely to be moved or even inspired by this unashamed fairy tale.

A new social studies teacher named Eugene Simonet (Spacey) starts his class by giving the students an assignment which is described by one of his seventh graders as a "bummer".

He tells his students to "think of a way to change our world and put it into action", an assignment of which they question the necessity.

Simonet does not spout any Michael Jackson-Ms. Universe cliches about making the world a better place. Instead, he wants them to prove "the world is not completely s---".

Eleven-year-old Trevor Mckinney (Osment) takes the assignment to heart, and not just because he is a highly impressionable kid.

Abandoned by his father and living with a harried mother Arlene (Helen Hunt), Trevor needs the world to be nicer to him.

His mother is barely at home because she works at two cocktail waitressing jobs, which are no help in her dealing with a serious alcohol problem.

After giving a homeless man shelter in the garage at his home, Trevor comes up with a "pay it forward" notion for the social studies class.

The idea is to give favors to three people and instead of paying back the favor, those who receive them should pay them forward to other people.

Trevor lists the first three people he will do favors for: the homeless man, his own mother and Simonet himself.

Trevor tries to fix up his mom with Simonet, whom he presumes is lonely.

Little does he know that Simonet is more than just a physically disfigured man after being burned in an unimaginable incident.

Trevor soon learns that his theory is not that easy to realize after the homeless man refuses to see him, and the relationship between his mom and Simonet does not work out.

Meanwhile, a journalist named Chris Chandler (Jay Mohr) is tracking down the phenomenon which is similar to Trevor's "pay it forward" notion after a stranger gives him a new Jaguar after he has a car problem.

Performances

It is hard to imagine that this film would work without the top-notch performances of the cast.

Spacey is impressive as always as a man who has something to hide beneath the surface, which this time is not even a smooth surface.

He succeeds in portraying Simonet as an injured man whom the audiences can connect to. The sight of Simonet ironing his shirts meticulously in the film represents a lot of things about this character, with his deep emotional scars driving him to view the world guardedly.

When Trevor asks Simonet what he has done to change the world, Simonet tells Trevor that he has passed the task onto him.

Oscar winner Hunt (As Good as it Gets) convincingly draws us into the life of a troubled woman living in a working-class section of Las Vegas.

The only time that she can forget about her gloomy life is when she digs into her washing machine to find a bottle of vodka.

A no-nonsense actress, Hunt dares to look totally unappealing in the film. The sight of her recovering from a hangover in an early scene is enough to make audiences jump from their seats in surprise.

Osment proves that his Oscar nomination for The Sixth Sense was no fluke. The child actor shows both strength and sensitivity that matches the intensity of the two adult leads.

While the film gets the most out of its leading players, it also benefits from its strong supporting cast, which includes James Caviezel from Frequency as the homeless man who only needs some decent clothes to be able to apply for a job. Mohr is also enjoyable as the curious journalist.

Angie Dickinson, the glamor queen of the 1960s and Police Woman in the 1970s, is particularly watchable as a bag lady by choice.

The presence of Jon Bon Jovi is surprisingly refreshing even with the haircut and the look which makes him looks like, well, Jon Bon Jovi.

Screenwriter Leslie Dixon succeeds in making the film stand above its subject's sentimentality.

Some changes have been made from the book by Catherine Ryan Hyde, including the change of the story's setting from a Californian town (Simonet was black in the book).

The sometimes contrived quality of the film does not detract from its overall quality. Have the Kleenex ready for the tear- jerking finale, and this bittersweet movie will only win over those who believe in people and the world.