There’s nothing wrong with “Charlie St. Cloud” that a different leading man couldn’t cure. At its basest, such summary spells harsh criticism for Zac Efron, but the better-than-average rating attached above shows the rationale is not so simple.
Efron’s Charlie is the high-school senior of dreams: son of a hard-working single mother (Kim Basinger, seen too briefly) and sibling of an idolizing 11-year-old brother (the very forthcoming Charlie Tahan). Though living in struggling middle-class existence, Charlie gently rubs it in the nose of the town elite, thriving in school and excelling at sailing, so good at the latter that it’s earned him a scholarship to Stanford.
Anyone who’s read Ben Sherwood’s novel — or seen the too-revealing studio trailer, for that matter — knows Charlie’s life takes a tragic turn. Suffice to say here that it prompts an awakening, remorseful yet spiritual, veering Charlie from stepping up amidst ivy-colored halls to holding fast within his quiet Northwest hometown.
Give credit to director Burr Steers for crafting a film which, in the wrong hands, easily could slip to the level of mediocre made-for-cable fare. Steers carefully choreographs Charlie’s delicate meeting with a similarly blessed sailing enthusiast (Amanda Crew) and delicately wrings the sentiment from his emotional rebirth.
That said, scold Steers for not advising Efron to pass on this drama after they’d teamed on the more lighthearted “17 Again.” Efron is a talent, to be sure, and his career is far from over. (The all-knowing www.imdb.com site lists the 22-year-old as having nine projects in some level of development.) Yet, plumbing the depth in the mystically entangled Charlie is beyond Efron’s still-developing acting skills and far-too-pretty face. That powerhouse dramatic vehicle awaits Efron, no doubt, but “Charlie St. Cloud” is not it.
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