You begin to wonder at Kevin Spacey's judgment. After his uneasy Dublin gangster in Ordinary Decent Criminal comes this sub-Robin Williams character in an insipidly written tale of an inspirational schoolteacher who gives a child (Haley Joel Osment) from a one-parent family (Helen Hunt) the idea for doing good deeds that encourage the recipient to do likewise.
On TV, at 50 minutes, it might have passed muster at some season of the year that encourages people to find their better side. But at this length, and without a single touch of distinction in performance or in Mimi Leder's direction, it proves a self-consciously sermonising bit of schmaltz.
Spacey, whose character was originally that of an African-American, isn't helped by what I assumed for half the film's length to be dreadful facial make-up, until it was off-handedly referred to as scars from a fire: presumably disfiguration is regarded in Hollywood as the acceptable collateral of being black.
Osment, the much-touted juvenile star of The Sixth Sense, fades back into the undistinguished moppetry. And even Helen Hunt looks like an actress who's had an apron tied on her to play a put-upon mom. The lesson is, if you feel like doing a good turn with your star power, make sure the film is as worthy as the cause.
Pay It Forward
Cert: cert12
