"I know there is something more, something that has been stolen." It is choosing day and Jonas (Thwaites) is told that he is to be a receiver of memories. He meets The Giver (Bridges) and is amazed at what he shows him. Jones learns quickly that the Utopia that everyone lives in is not as perfect as it seems. After experiencing color and emotions Jonas wants to show everyone what he knows. The Elders are not happy with what is going on and they do all they can to stop Jonas, but he will stop at nothing to make everyone remember. I had no idea what to expect from this movie at all. I never read the book and only caught glimpses of trailers. I expected another teenager-y save the world movie so I sat down with pretty low expectations. I have to say that I was very surprised at how much I liked this. The easiest way to describe this is a combination of Divergent and Pleasantville. When you watch you will see exactly what I mean (as long as you have seen both of those movies). This is a great family movie and my entire family loved it. It is rated PG- 13 and I think it is because of one small part but you will not have to have your hand on the pause or fast forward button if you are watching this with your family. Overall, this is just a good movie that the whole family will enjoy. I give this a B+.

After the Ruin, the Community was build as an utopia where everybody is the same, emotions are suppressed and memories of the past are restricted. When Jonas turns 18, he's selected to be the community's Receiver of Memories. His best friends Fiona and Asher also turn 18. He goes to train with The Giver (Jeff Bridges) to learn the memories of the past. Meryl Streep plays the Chief Elder. Katie Holmes and Alexander Skarsgård play Jonas' parents. The previous Receiver Rosemary (Taylor Swift) 10 years ago came to a tragic end.

The idea of colors and memories are interesting. I especially like the idea of memories which reminds me a little of 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind'. This is not nearly as artistic or compelling. There is just enough that one gets a small taste of something much better and what this could have been.

I also have questions about this world. This world feels incomplete like the author explained it in a paragraph and the reader fills in the gap. The movie just hasn't filled those gaps with enough precision. I do have to praise this franchise. It seems to be a little bit more ambitious than the others but I wouldn't say it's complete. Also it fails as a movie to be intense. The climax is there but without much excitement. The final scene is really just asking for a sequel which is probably not coming.

The acting is functional. Most of them are required to be distant and controlled. Jeff Bridges, Odeya Rush and Brenton Thwaites are the only ones required to act out emotions. Meryl Streep may actually be acting too much. I have to say that I like Katie Holmes acting removed which kind of fits her. Thwaites is asked to calibrate his acting and he does a reasonable job. Rush is pretty effective and quite touching. Jeff Bridges is doing basically the same note.

"The Giver" is an American movie that was released roughly a year ago. It takes place in a parallel universe in a world where emotions have vanished. The goal of the world's leaders was to get rid of the negative emotions and occurrences resulting from them (such as war). Unfortunately, they lost the positive emotions as well on the way to achieving their goal. So you will not be very surprised I guess to hear that this film is about bringing these emotions back. The cast is really good, includes Meryl Streep, Jeff Bridges and a couple young talented actors, such as Brenton Thwaites, who plays the central character. The director is Phillip Noyce, a pretty experienced filmmaker from Australia. I don't think I have seen any of his other works though.

Let me start with the positive: The world created here is pretty memorable and there is certainly some smart writing included in these slightly under 90 minutes (without credits). Some good love to detail and interesting aspects where I thought that maybe it is not completely different to the world we live in. Unfortunately, there are also weaknesses. First of all, I found the difference they made with black-and-white versus color fairly uninspired. It has been done so many times already and it did not feel particularly smart to me. And as convincingly as the world was written, I cannot say the same about the characters. Some of them are really stereotypical and by the books and none of their actions ever surprised me I must say. A great thumbs-up to Jeff Bridges, who was certainly the MVP here and elevated the material a lot. I wish I could say the same about Streep, who gave a good performance and the makeup fits her nicely as well, but her character is just so uninteresting that I'd almost call her one of the least memorable 2014 film villains I've seen. And finally, why would her character choose his friend to go and stop him? A complete rookie for such an important mission? The only reason I can come up with and that would work in the film's favor is that she acted as she had to in her position, but in reality wanted him not to be stopped on his mission. Still, I felt the friendship with Asher played such an important role near the end and certainly may have needed better elaboration early on.

All in all, I think it is a good movie with some really interesting scenes. On a little side note, I am fairly certain we will see a lot more from Odeya Rush in the future. She has the talent and looks for a great career. Even if true greatness was missing, The Giver is a clever modern take on Orwell's 1984 and I recommend it.