This role almost feels like something that might combine Tom Hanks’ movie Castaway with The Postman while putting a science fiction lean to it. If anyone is wondering what I’m talking about it’s due to the idea that Hanks plays the titular character, Finch, who is a robotics engineer that is one of the few survivors of a cataclysmic solar event, something that doesn’t get covered much in disaster movies, and he’s teaching a robot he built why it’s great to be alive as he, the robot, that names itself Jeff, and his dog Goodyear take a trek into the west, perhaps to see if anything is left. It’s a big hope that the visuals of this movie will be up to snuff, but one can already tell the acting will be since Hanks is after all one of the best in the business and age hasn’t really done anything to slow him down yet. Every actor has a common theme in a lot of their movies, not all of them, but some, that shows how each individual tends to cling to one idea as they find different ways to present it.
Hanks has definitely been in a few movies where isolation has been a big theme, as one could cite Castaway yet again, and even Apollo 13 in a way since despite being with two other individuals he was still stuck in an untenable situation that demanded his full attention in order to survive. The Terminal is another survival situation of sorts since his character was stuck in an airport and didn’t understand English well enough to comprehend that his home country had been overthrown and he was essentially a man without a country. There are definitely a few of Hanks’s movies that deal with this theme since it stands to reason that the isolation angle can be used in a lot of different ways in a movie. In this particular movie, he’s an individual that has survived because of his intelligence, likely a bit of luck, and because he knew how to essentially build another companion.
Disaster movies are also a great way to reflect on the human condition since despite the fact that solar flares are something that can’t be controlled or even prevented. Instead, it becomes a reflection on the fact that humanity is indeed very fragile when it comes to dealing with nature and there’s no way to tell sometimes just when things will happen that will shorten our already relatively short lifespans. This is no doubt why Finch will be imparting to Jeff just why it’s a great thing to be alive and why it’s valued so much by those that experience life. It’s a fleeting thing when compared to the world around us after all, and it’s something that we can’t help but feel when we actually take the time to think about it. A few of Tom Hanks’ movies definitely seek to remind people that the lives we lead are important not just because of what we can do for ourselves and for each other, but because it’s a gift that’s given and shouldn’t be squandered. There’s a chance for every life to mean something great and to be a part of something grand in one way or another, but a lot of people take that for granted and don’t see the inherent value of it.
A disaster movie is meant to show us that as bad as we think things can get, they can get much, much worse in a very short time, and the lives that we think are so horrible will look entirely fixable by comparison. But apart from the doom and gloom, Finch sounds like a movie that will be about companionship as well and the endurance of the human spirit and all that kind of positive stuff that people love to hear in their movies. It’s something that Tom Hanks is good at as well since he can take a bit of drama one way or another and turn it into something that people will absolutely want to watch. One can already imagine that hearing his name is enough for a lot of people to want to see what this movie is all about since he tends to be a very entertaining actor to enjoy.
This will still be a little different to be certain since the role of a robotics engineer isn’t exactly something that Tom Hanks has done a lot of in his time as an actor, so the accuracy of it is what a lot of people might want to watch. In terms of being inspirational and uplifting though, he’s been doing that for so long in the movies that it’s likely second nature at this point. So to be sure, Finch might be a decent movie that a lot of people might enjoy.
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