The Bucket List

This one was already on my list to see even before E mentioned how good it was.  His endorsement just moved it up a little so it became a priority to check it out this weekend.  It was rather ironic considering "The Bucket List" focused on the relationship between two old friends.

Edward Cole (Jack Nicholson) and Carter Chambers (Morgan Freeman) did not start off as two old friends.  They didn't even know each other.  It was chance that both had an episode that led to their discovery of cancer.  They end up as roommates in the same hospital room and strike up a friendship due to their connection with their terminal illness and respect for each other.

Carter begins scribbling a bucket list of things he wants to do before he dies.  Edward decides it is not only best to renovate the list but also for them to break out of the hospital and act on it.  It leads to a road of discovery as they both find deeper meaning in what point they are at in their lives.

The two characters would definitely be me and E.  The entire excursion is without a doubt something we would do if we were terminally ill with cancer.  Oh, and of course if one of us had enough money to afford worldwide gallivanting like that. 

I didn't get how Edward owns several hospitals and he can't get a clinic with executive treatment?  Granted, there is some nobility in wanting to get treatment at one of his own facilities.  He could prove his theory that there truly are no exceptions to his two beds to a room policy.  However, his personality is established as such right away that he doesn't care what other people think.  An ego like that would have gotten some exclusive facility where he could get his every need catered to by a private staff. 

The obvious problem being is if you only had a few days left to live, family should be factored in more.  Edward isn't married, but Morgan's is.  With any minute being his last, one would think more time would be invested in sharing those last moments with his family. Bucket lists are all fine and good, but when you only have a limited amount of time to spend the waning moments with your family, who wouldn't take advantage of that.

They actually build up to that notion by later exposing the cliche that money can't buy you everything.  Carter character returns home to find that the companionship of his family was greater than anything he could have placed on his bucket list.  Meanwhile, Edward discovers that family should have been on his list all along. 

A movie like this causes us all to think and take some inventory.  Everyone has at least a mental list of things they want to accomplish before they die.  However, how many of us really evaluate the things that aren't on the list that we have often taken for granted?  One man's bucket list is another man's accomplishments. 

Both Freeman and Nicholson are at the top of their game in "The Bucket List".  There are few actors that can successfully employ humor and grief so well in the same movie.  Edward's three things to remember when you get older...HILARIOUS!  Never thought about any of them too much but they are something that we should all keep in mind.  Never thought this film would be one of the best films I had seen this year either, but it was. 

My rating:  A-