***1/2 (out of ****)
Starring Alex Etel, Lewis McGibbon, Daisy Donovan, Christopher Fulford, and James Nesbitt
Directed by Danny Boyle & written by Patrick Cottrell Boyce
2004 (2005 wide release)
98 min G
So many children’s movies are noisy commercials for noisy toys, portraying children as “want-want-want!” little screamers while teaching the kids in the audience to think small. Danny Boyle’s “Millions” is a charming little gem that reminds us that some, even many children actually have a phase when they genuinely want to help people and make the world a better place. They aren’t like this out of guilt or duty, but because they honestly, simply, and naively love human beings. I remember being like that, before the weight of the world crushed my spirit.
“Millions” posits that children who never grow out of this phase are the ones who become saints. The suspense in “Millions” is whether its young hero will stick to his guns or “grow up” and become just another selfish little punk buying himself stuff off the internet because he thinks he knows he can’t make a difference. Our hero is a little British boy named Damian (Alex Etel) who is visited in daydreams by the likes of St. Francis, St. Nicholas, and St. Peter. When he and his older brother Anthony (Lewis McGibbon) find a huge bag of money, Anthony can only spend it on himself, while Damian is hellbent on finding some poor people who deserve it.
The movie has a lot of fun attacking Damian with cynicism from all sides: his school, his gated community, even his father (“Waking Ned Devine’s” James Nesbitt), and the poverty fund-raising woman (Daisy Donovan) from the school. When the thief (Christopher Fulford) who stole the money in the first place shows up, Damian can’t help feeling a bit relieved that the money—and the responsibility to save the world that goes with it—will be taken off his hands. “Millions” is set up so the kids are the ones we understand, while the adults live in the kind of incongruous universe of inexplicable actions and almost grotesque cheerfulness (it’s kind of “City of Lost Children Lite”). Director Boyle tells “Millions” with the same trickery he uses in “Trainspotting” and “A Life Less Ordinary,” and the movie has the bouncy, colorful feel of a “Mario Brothers” video game, without the threat of seizures.
What is perhaps most amazing is that, even though “Millions” is essentially chastising us for losing our child-like faith, and chastising us for taunting everyone who hasn’t become as jaded as we are, it never wags its finger at us, but lets us share in the joy of Damian’s wonder-filled world. The saints are neither all-knowing nor are they revisionist, but come across as filled with a giddy, grinning love of sharing life with others. “Millions” also softens moments that could have been too maudlin with goofy one-liners. The scene near the end when Damian has one last visitor from beyond the grave is kind of unforgivable. Maybe that’s to balance out St. Catherine lighting up a fag when she’s talking to him earlier.
Finished Saturday, October 8th, 2005
Copyright © 2005 Friday & Saturday Night
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