"Collateral Beauty" is a film about life, with an all star cast, starring Kate Winslet, Will Smith, and Helen Mirren. It is about a man who hasn’t fully come to terms with his daughter’s death. The death of his daughter has an effect not only on himself, but the people around him. Surprisingly, this film only received 12 percent on rotten tomatoes. I was surprised by this rating, because I was very impressed with the film. I thought the idea was outside the box. It takes something that happens during everyday life, and added creativity to a story. What made it a bad film to some people? Were the characters not well rounded? Was the story-line not strong enough? The film gets its message across, yes it has some true, inspirational lines in the film, but it is still something everyone can be reminded of; that life itself is a gift.
Will Smith’s character decides to write a letter to personas of death, love, and time. He writes them to express his pain after the death of his 6-year-old daughter. Another reason the film is good, is its ability to connect with everyone. Everyone has crossed paths with death at some point in their lives, whether it be losing a loved one, or it’s time to transition. Death is no stranger, as "he" teaches, and equips the audience with the proper tools to overcome a tragic loss of a loved one. Death, love, and time introduce themselves to Smith’s character to help him cope with his loss. The other characters, Claire, Whit, and Simon, are also dealing with their own personal issues, and seem to share the unhappiness with Smith's character. Claire feels she missed the time to make a family, because she has spent much of her time helping Smith's character with the business. Whit, has a failed marriage and a daughter that seems to hate him. He must reunite with love in order to fight for his daughter’s affection. Simon is a hard working man that wants his family to survive. His concern is to make sure his family won’t be out on the street when he’s gone. He accepts the fact that he isn’t going to be with his family much longer, but it isn’t easy to tell them the news.
Whit comes up with a bright idea to hire three actors to help Smith's character overcome his depressed state. It’s starting to cause some serious damage to the company now that they are losing funding. They all agree with Whit’s plan, (I promise it’s not a spoiler) to hire the three actors. One to play death, another to play love, and the last actor to play time. I promise, if you love inspirational films, then you’ll love this story as it tugs on your heart strings and possibly making you cry.
