The Lovely Bones
Short description
The Lovely Bones centres on Susie Salmon, a fourteen-year-old girl in Norristown, Pennsylvania, who is murdered in December 1973 after being lured by a neighbour into a hiding place he has built underground. She was on her way home from school, having just begun to grow close to a classmate, Ray Singh, and she leaves behind parents, a younger sister and a grandmother. From a space between life and the afterlife, Susie watches her family absorb the loss while the man responsible goes undiscovered, and she is pulled between wanting him caught and wanting her relatives to recover and move forward.
Peter Jackson directed and wrote the screenplay with Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, the team behind several of his earlier productions. The film is the eleventh of the fifteen he has directed, following King Kong and preceding The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. Saoirse Ronan plays Susie, with Mark Wahlberg and Rachel Weisz as her parents, Susan Sarandon as Grandma Lynn, Rose McIver as her sister Lindsey, and Stanley Tucci as George Harvey. It is a British, New Zealand and American co-production.
Made for about 65 million US dollars, the film took roughly 94 million worldwide, a modest return. Audience reactions were warmer than critical ones: on IMDb it holds 6.6 from about 191,000 votes, and on TMDB 7.1 from around 5,000, while the critics' rating stands at 5.1 from 246 reviews.
What's left behind the scenes
- The film is based on Alice Sebold's novel *The Lovely Bones* (2002).
- Alice Sebold – the author of the book the film is based on – strongly wanted an unknown actress to play the lead role in the movie.
- At one time, Helen Hunt auditioned for the role of Abigail Salmon. She was later replaced by Rachel Weisz, who ultimately played the part in the film.
- Peter Jackson appears in the film at the 59th minute in a small cameo – as a man with a camera in the shopping mall.
- Saoirse Ronan was cast in the role without an audition. She impressed everyone by sending an audio cassette with recorded dialogues from the book.
- In one of the film's scenes, you can notice a poster for the book “The Lord of the Rings”.
- By the time location shooting began in Pennsylvania, the cast was almost completely assembled, but suddenly, a day before the start, it was announced that Ryan Gosling was dropping out of the project and Mark Wahlberg would be playing Jack Salmon. Creative differences were cited as the reason for the replacement.
- Saoirse Ronan was cast in the role without an audition after sending an audio cassette with recorded monologues from the book.
- Helen Hunt auditioned for the role of Abigail.
- Susan Sarandon, who played Grandma Lynn, was born Susan Abigail Tomalin, meaning her double name coincides with the names of the film's heroines.
- In the trailer, in the bookstore section of the supermarket, Suzie is holding a copy of Vogue magazine, but in the film its name has been changed to Seventeen.
- Alice Sebold, the author of the original novel, strongly wanted an unknown actress to play the lead role.
- Director and screenwriter Peter Jackson decided to adapt Alice Sebold's novel because he liked how the dark themes were combined with the book's “light” tone, sense of hope, and humor. Peter was also impressed by how the author depicted the afterlife and the heroine's emotions.
- The book that served as the source material for the film was inspired by the personal experience of writer Alice Sebold, who survived an assault in her youth.
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
