Cast Away (2000)

I don't think people appreciate just how good of a film Cast Away is. To have essentially one actor occupy 80 minutes of the film's screen time is no easy task. In order to have a high level of involvement and focus with just one character, the actor must deliver a superb performance, the writers must create a believable and likable character, and the director must engage the audience with the story. A seemingly boring film on the surface will never get old to me.

The story follows Chuck Noland, a Fedex oversees shipment employee. He leads a simple life home and away from his longtime girlfriend Kelly. As he leaves for some shipments of Christmas and New Years gifts, she gives him a pocket watch with her picture and he leaves a special present for her to open on New Years. The problem is that Chuck does not return for New Years. His plain crashes somewhere over the Pacific. Chuck manages to survive as he floats to the shore of a small island in the middle of nowhere. To expect savages or rabid animals on the island is unrealistic, just as anticipating rescue is. 

For the next 80 minutes, the audience is treated to Chuck's struggle in isolation. With a few items washed up on shore, Wilson the volleyball and Kelly's picture, Chuck devises a few plans to escape the shores of the island, whether through boating back or suicide. However, for four years, Chucks plans fail. It isn't until Chuck decides that there is nothing left to live for on the island that he takes the ultimate gamble at sea on a makeshift raft. When he loses Wilson in one of the most emotional goodbye scenes in all of cinema, there is nothing left for him. In the most unrealistic turn in a rather realistic film, a ship finds Chuck at sea.

Upon his return to life, things have changed in four years. Chuck has already had a funeral and Kelly had left him. No one is at fault here since Chuck's return is such an unlikely proposition. Instead, the film is maddeningly realistic as a man who had one thing to live for couldn't even return to life with that one thing. That is the sad reality to Chuck's existence.

This film is powerful not just because of its story, but also because of the masterful filmmaking behind the scenes. Tom Hanks delivers a resounding performance and Zemeckis' direction is brilliant. Conclusion: Must See

Rating: 9/10