Collateral Beauty (2016)

After his young daughter dies, the head (Will Smith) of an advertising company lets the business slide. His three partners (Kate Winslet, Edward Norton, Michael Pena) hire three actors to play Death (Helen Mirren), Love (Keira Knightley) and Time (Jacob Latimore) to help him through the grieving process. Dreadful! I felt like I was reading platitudes from sympathy cards for 90 minutes! I suppose I should be grateful it wasn't a 2 hour film. Talk about your manipulative, sentimental "new age" (yes, I know it's not the 70s anymore but that term applies here) twaddle! I suppose on paper it might have looked workable which explains how so many good actors got roped in. But director David Frankel's heavy hand hammers home every trite tearjerking phrase as if they were pearls of profundity. It's the first Kate Winslet performance that I could call bad. Can't say the same for Helen Mirren who's been worse but she's pretty crappy here too. No doubt there will be those blubbering by the film's end and accuse we dried eyed cynics as having no heart but it really is godawful! With Naomie Harris, who thankfully has MOONLIGHT this year to be proud of.