BOTTOM LINE: Peter Jackson has fashioned a tragic, beautiful and unsettling story in “The Lovely Bones”, with an unusual narrative which follows the aftermath of the murder of a 14-year old girl at the hands of a serial killer, with a stunning performance by Saoirse Ronan.

THE GOOD: Based on the book by Alice Sebold, “The Lovely Bones” sees director Peter Jackson enter a more independent film mode, but he manages to combine that with his big-screen story telling sensibilities to perfection. 14-year old Susie Salmon (Saorise Ronan) is kidnapped and brutally murdered by serial killer George Harvey (Stanley Tucci), the neighbour from across the road. Susie becomes caught in the world between heaven and earth, no longer living but still in touch with her family and the killer her haunts her new existence. Back on Earth, her family is torn apart by their grief and her father’s (Mark Wahlberg) search for the killer. “The Lovely Bones” is a unique film experience, taking us on a journey through the after-life, while at the same time, taking us through the pain and anguish of a family losing a child. Somehow Peter Jackson manages to give all of this a hauntingly beautiful quality, particularly in the sequences where we see Susie in the after life. There is also room for menace and foreboding, with Stanley Tucci giving an incredibly creepy performance as the serial killer. The film is not what you might expect, and plugs in to an idea that the universe and destiny will make everything right in the end, despite the tragedy. Jackson does a great job with the actors in this film too, but his real find was Saoirse Ronan who gives a wonderful performance as Susie. Jackson uses her character to create moments of joy, wonder and anger, with one stand out sequence, that will send chills down your spine, occurring when Susie realises that she is dead and she comes face to face with her killer. “The Lovely Bones” is an unusual yet engrossing film, and well worth watching on the big screen.

THE BAD: This will entirely depend on your taste, but the film does not give you that thorough sense of closure that you might expect from what is in effect a murder-mystery tale. The bad guy does get his justice, but not in the way that you might want or imagine, given that he dies through an accident with the family never knowing that he was the killer. That death itself is almost absurd in that his tumbling and crashing down a cliff was obviously put in to make you feel satisfied that this evil man got a painful death, but one wonders how much better it would have been if Jackson had been allowed to leave it as he originally intended with the subtle shot of him disappearing off the edge. Despite the stunning cast, there is one mis-judgment in that Mark Wahlberg does not quite fit in to the ensemble. It could be that the material does not suit his style, but whenever he shows up, something feels off. “The Lovely Bones” is more like a poem about life, destiny and the universe rather than a narrative, and if this is not your thing, then you may not like the film.