Kiwi Film Review: Rain Man

IMDB: 8.0/10

Rotten Tomatoes: 88%

Roger Ebert: 3.5/4 Stars

Stars: Dustin Hoffman, Tom Cruise

Directed By: Barry Levinson

Written: Barry Marrow, Ronald Bass

Described by IMDB as :"Charles Sanford "Charlie" Babbit is a self-centered Los Angeles-based automobile dealer/hustler/bookie who is at war with his own life. Charlie, as a young teenager, used his father's 1948 Buick convertible without permission and as a result, he went to jail for two days on account that his father reported it stolen. It is then that Charlie learns that his estranged father died and left him from his last will and testament a huge bed of roses and the car while the remainder will of $3 Million goes into a trust fund to be distributed to someone. Charlie seemed pretty angry by this and decides to look into this matter. It seems as if that "someone" is Raymond, Charlie's unknown brother, an autistic savant who lives in a world of his own, resides at the Walbrook Institute. Charlie then kidnaps Raymond and decides to take him on a lust for life trip to the west coast as a threat to get the $3 Million inheritance..."

Rain Man? I don’t even know where to begin. First of all, Tom Cruise can act? This genuinely surprised me. I mean, I guess I knew he could “act” as I’ve seen him in a lot of movies, but his performance really showed me a new side of him. However, the best part of the movie BY FAR was Dustin Hoffman. Seriously, are we sure that he isn’t actually Autistic? He was SO convincing. The storyline was great, and the writing was excellent. Such a great concept, and the character development was fantastic. Tom Cruise’s character, Charlie Babbitt, goes from an egotistical asshole to a loving brother right before our eyes. I found it pretty difficult to sit through the moments when people were giving Raymond(Dustin Hoffman) a hard time for having a mental disability, but I guess that just makes me a normal human being. 

I’m ashamed to say that I hadn’t seen this movie until tonight. If anyone hasn’t seen it yet, seriously, get on that. Follow @gilldawe