Страна:США Слоган:«Жизнь – это самое удивительное шоу на свете» Режиссер:Френсис Лоуренс Сценарий:Сара Груэн, Ричард ЛаГравенес Продюсер:Кевин Халлоран, Джил Неттер, Эрвин Стофф, ... Оператор:Родриго Прието Композитор:Джеймс Ньютон Ховард Жанр:Драма Статус:Выпущен Продолжительность:116 мин. Премьера (мир):22 апреля 2011 Премьера (РФ):21 апреля 2011 В главных ролях: Роберт Паттинсон Риз Уизерспун Кристоф Вальц Джеймс Фрейн Хэл Холбрук Пол Шнайдер Кен Фори Тим Гини Дэн Лория Описание:Времена Великой депрессии. Студент-ветеринар Якоб бросает учебу после того, как его родители погибают, и присоединяется к «Benzini Brothers», самому грандиозному цирковому шоу на Земле. Там он начинает работать ветеринаром, а заодно и влюбляется в прекрасную наездницу Марлену, которая, правда, замужем за Августом, харизматичным, но жестоким дрессировщиком.
(ссылка устаревает каждый день - меняется дата, поэтому на сайте пользуйтесь поиском по ключевым словам "critic reviews") + Empire gives 3/5 to 'Water for Elephants' DVD 2 featurettes — 1 in which cast and crew swoon over R-Pattz Plot During the Great Depression homeless veterinary student Jacob (Pattinson) joins a struggling circus and falls in love with its star attraction, animal trainer Marlena (Witherspoon). When Marlena’s husband, tyrannical circus owner August (Waltz), acquires an unhappy elephant, Jacob and Marlena bond over her care, inflaming the unstable August’s vicious streak...
Review Adapted (by Richard LaGravenese) from a bestseller by Sara Gruen, this romantic period drama is exactly the sort of thing — an old person wistfully begins telling the story of a long-ago adventure, cueing richer colour and a 90-minute flashback — that gets made for television and airs in a weekday matinée slot. The difference is that made-for-TV jobbies invariably star people from cancelled TV series, whereas this Big Top turn has a big-screen budget and a cast led by Twilight heartthrob Robert Pattinson and Oscar-winners Reese Witherspoon and Christoph Waltz.
Eighty-six year-old Hal Holbrook gamely kicks it off as Old Jacob Jankowski, who wanders geriatrically around a modern circus and is taken in by the young owner. When he learns Jacob is an old circus hand who survived a famous disaster of the 1930s, he settles in to hear the tale of the Benzini Bros’ travelling show. It’s one of tragedy, deceit, illusion, abuse, murder and, oh yes, secret love. Nastiness and brutality vie with attempts to evoke the magic of circus, but these have a desperate and unconvincing mood. While young boys of a bygone age may well have dreamed of orgies with Hootchie-Cootchie dancers and drunken dwarves, such outbursts of colourful fun are curiously joyless, and the romance feels equally forced. Thank heavens the climactic catastrophe is appropriately dreadful.
Witherspoon, it is said, loved the book. One suspects it was the costumes she loved best here, the pink sequins, marabou feathers and bias-cut frocks. For a dying circus whose unpaid roustabouts and moth-eaten animals are starving, she’s almost too glamorous, holding court in a handsomely appointed railway carriage boudoir. Pattinson is, in his quiet way, the sympathetic central character since his ardent, feeling young Jacob is the one commencing a big life journey. But Waltz’s terrifyingly unpredictable August is horribly fascinating, all charming and charismatic one moment and savagely sadistic the next.
Verdict Familiar but enjoyable. Not being funny, the elephant (Rosie, played by nine-foot enchantress Tai) is the real star as the most moving and only joyful presence in sight.
Она вообще ОЧЕНЬ клевая... 
