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Subscribe to weekly newsletter » times & tickets in theaters Fandango Search movie Carnage showtimes and buy Contraband tickets. The Iron Lady Joyful Noise and in “We Bought a Zoo." Newlyweds about us Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory We Bought a Zoo Sundance shorts 2012 About the site » more current releases » BY ROGER EBERT / December 21, 2011 Site FAQs » one-minute movie reviews There really is a Benjamin Contact us » Mee, and he and his family still playing really did buy a zoo. The cast & credits Email the Movie in The Adventures of Tintin Answer Man » Benjamin Matt Damon Devon, England, was America the Beautiful 2: The Thin Commandments opened in 1968, closed in Kelly Scarlett Johansson Anonymous 2006 and then was Duncan Thomas Haden Church Answers to Nothing on sale now purchased by the Mee Robin Jones Patrick Fugit The Artist family. In adapting these Dylan Colin Ford Being Elmo: A Puppeteer's Journey facts into the movie "We Lily Boy Wonder Bought a Zoo," all Cameron Peter Angus Macfadyen Carnage Crowe has done is move it The Conquest to Southern California, Contraband 20th Century Fox presents a film supply it with a staff of A Dangerous Method directed by . character actors, add two The Descendants romances and a villain. The Written by Aline Brosh McKenna The Double Elite Squad: The Enemy Within result is too much formula and Crowe, based on the book by Benjamin Mee. Running time: 124 Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life Buy now » and not enough human Garbo the Spy minutes. Rated PG (for language interest. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and some thematic elements). Happy Feet Two Not that the film is without Le Havre charms as a choice for the Printer-friendly » The Heir Apparent: Largo Winch holiday season. Matt E-mail this to a friend » Hugo Damon makes a sturdy and Immortals likable Benjamin Mee, and In the Land of Blood and Honey Scarlett Johansson, as the In Time head of the zoo's animal Into the Abyss: A Tale of Death, A Tale of Life Buy now » keepers, seems adamantly unaware that she's in a script that The Iron Lady requires her to sooner or later kiss the hero. We even see Patrick J. Edgar Fugit, immortal as the hero of Crowe's "," as a Jamie and Jessie are Not Together member of the zoo staff named Robin Jones. He's never seen Joyful Noise Kinyarwanda without a monkey on his shoulder, though that's his only point of The Last Rites of Joe May interest. ("What do we do to make the Robin character interesting?" Letters from the Big Man "He always has a monkey on his shoulder.") The Lie Like Crazy At the film's outset, Benjamin Mee is still in mourning after the death Margin Call Buy now » of his wife. He's raising their kids Dylan (Colin Ford), in his mid-teens, Martha Marcy May Marlene and Rosie (Maggie Elizabeth Jones), who is 7. Dylan is nabbed for Melancholia shoplifting, and Benjamin, a journalist, decides it's time to leave the Mighty Macs big city and raise them in the country. He finds an ideal house, which The Mill and the Cross the real-estate agent only gradually explains comes with its own Miss Minoes menagerie. The place was once a private zoo, shut down for reasons Mission: Impossible -- Ghost Protocol involving money and regulations, and Kelly Foster (Johansson) minds The Muppets the animals with the help of Peter (Angus Macfadyen), a pipe-puffing My Week with Marilyn New Year's Eve Scotsman, and Kelly's teen niece, Lily (Elle Fanning), who seems not Newlyweds entirely unaware she's in a script that may require her to sooner or Norman Buy now » later kiss Dylan. Oranges and Sunshine Outrage Benjamin's brother, Duncan (Thomas Haden Church), is an Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory accountant who urgently advises Ben not to buy a zoo. Well, that's Paranormal Activity 3 the function of a good accountant. How many times has my own Pariah accountant entreated me, "Roger, whatever you do, don't buy a zoo!" Passione Paul Goodman Changed My Life Kelly is a great-looking woman (after all, she looks like Scarlett Raiders of the Lost Ark Johansson), but she's all business, dedicated to the welfare of the Revenge of the Electric Car The Rum Diary Buy now » animals. She can see that Benjamin has a lot to learn. One of their first differences involves Spar, an old Bengal tiger who is in deep Shame Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows depression. (So would we all be, if we had to live alone for 16 years Silent Souls in an efficiency apartment.) Should Spar be put down? Kelly and Ben The Sitter have an emotional debate. The Skin I Live In The Son of No One The villain is Walter Ferris (John Michael Higgins), an anal-retentive Steve Jobs: The Lost Interview animal control officer who enforces strict standards involving the care Sundance shorts 2012 and housing of the animals. Walter is a nit-picker and a bit of a sadist, Texas Killing Fields threatening to deny the place a license if fences don't comply within a That Girl in Yellow Boots Buy now » fraction of an inch. He is invaluable to the writers, Aline Brosh 3 McKenna and Crowe himself, providing them with a device to Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy generate a series of crises and deadlines through which Benjamin Tower Heist and his staff, working together, begin to bond. Cute young Lily's love The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1 for the animals soon begins to inspire Dylan to dial down and begin to Tyrannosaur Urbanized love the zoo. A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas War Horse You'd think a movie like this would be ideal for animal lovers. Not so We Bought a Zoo much. The animals are mostly held at arm's length, like, well, animals The Wise Kids Buy now» in a zoo. Some snakes get closer; a sequence involving a crate of big The Women on the 6th Floor poisonous snakes seems completely contrived. The World is Big and Salvation Lurks Around the Corner Young Adult "We Bought a Zoo" started me thinking about "The Descendants." Young Goethe in Love Both involve fathers faced with raising two kids (about the same more current releases » ages) after the deaths of their wives. Both have big stars as their leads. Both involve making major life decisions. One has Hawaii as a supporting character, one has a zoo. "The Descendants" is getting on dvd some of the best reviews of the year. "We Bought a Zoo," not so much. Cameron Crowe has made wonderful films, but here the new on dvd Buy now» pieces go together too easily, the plot is too inevitable, and we feel little real energy between the players. 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