After the tragic deaths of his parents in 1930s Great Depression-set America, Jacob Jankowski (Robert Pattinson), a final-year Ivy League veterinary medicine student, jumps on a moving train and into a life with a traveling circus, headed by the troubled, tyrannical August (Christoph Waltz). The circus master’s wife Marlena (Reese Witherspoon) is the troupe’s human star attraction (the other one’s a horse at the start of the story, which dies and is replaced by a cheeky elephant), and she can’t help but tease Jankowski’s heartstrings. Complications ensue.
One might argue that Witherspoon’s portrayal of Marlena is soulless, but you could also say that this captures the essence of Marlena’s character: A woman who spent most of her orphan childhood between homes, marrying August as a means of escaping uncertainty, only to spend her life on a train—all circumstances that force her to be shrewd and hardened while having to play gentle wife to the volatile August.
Pattinson’s acting is a little stiff at the start, with a range of expressions that suggest he’s constipated, but does gradually become more fluid as the movie progresses. That, perhaps, encapsulates Jacob’s transition from awkward upper-class college boy to a weathered, street-smart grown-up. That said, with this being another tortured heartthrob role, we can’t help but feel that poor Pattinson’s been typecast. Predictably, it is Waltz who carries most of the film’s acting chops, with gripping performances reminiscent of his role in Inglourious Basterds. Despite the foul demeanor of his character, he lends us a moment or two of sympathy.
Outwardly, the film addresses a love triangle, but underlying themes of illusion versus reality and instinct versus reason prevail.