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As a big fan of Peter Jackson it pains me to say this. The Lovely Bones simply doesn’t work.

Based on a dreamy, meditative book by Alice Sebold, Bones is the very definition of an unfilmable property. On paper it is the haunting story of a 14-year-old girl who is raped and murdered by a man in her neighborhood, and then watches the resulting effect this has on her mother, father and younger sister. Author Sebold, herself a victim of rape, created a phantasmal dreamscape for Susie to inhabit after she’s dead; not Heaven, but a kind of ephemeral waiting room, referred to as the ‘in-between’ by those already there.

On film and in the hands of a director as literal as Jackson (this is the same guy who once evaporated hordes of zombies with a push mower) Lovely Bones seems far too passive and breezy to account for its most sinister and disarming scene; Susie’s death at the hands of her murderer, played by Tucci as an uncomfortably sleazy pedophile stereotype. Jackson handles it with a delicate touch and doesn’t show anything terribly disturbing, but all of the surrounding details generate their own queasiness.

The technical achievements of the film are hard to argue with. The cinematography by Andrew Lesnie is spellbinding and lush and it captures such lyrical scenes as Susie’s father staring at a flickering candle and wondering if his daughter might be nearby, or Susie’s moments late in the film where she’s reaches beyond the grave to experience a few stolen moments of adolescent pleasure. The visual effects in the ‘in-between’ are also well done and relatively imaginative. Unfortunately there’s nothing for the filmmakers to grasp because in Sebold’s prose this afterlife is little more than a plot device.

The result is a series of computer-generated images that feel like a music video instead of a functioning and expansive dream world. The score by Brian Eno may be the element of the film most capable of standing on its own, but it fails to really add much commentary on the rest. Jackson’s directing has always been expressive and immediate. When he’s staging a fantasy battle between monstrous armies or a giant gorilla and hungry dinosaurs he can deliver the goods like nobody’s business. Here, where a softer, more thoughtful touch is required, he ends up decimating moments that were awkward to begin with.

On the acting front, there are some great performances on display. Saoirse Ronan proves she has the potential to become a great actress, and I hope that Jackson finds a use for her elfin features and charming persona in one of the upcoming Tolkien adaptations. As Susie she registers almost immediately and when her life is cut short, so is her character’s impact on the storyline. Wahlberg and Weisz are usually capable actors who usually elevate the films they are in. Here, where their story should be the primary focus, they are pushed to the background and have to settle for capturing small moments of grief and loss. Susan Sarandon as the hippie grandmother and Stanley Tucci as the creepy killer fare the worst. They aren’t bad per se, but the movie abuses their effort and they swamp the boat every time they show up. Jackson seems at a loss for what to do with them and when he finds something it feels ham-handed and forced. Tucci’s final moments on the film are inexcusably laughable and bewildering.

After seeing The Lovely Bones and having read its source material, it’s hard to imagine how this one could have been done effectively. When I saw the trailers I hoped that Jackson would be able to give Bones a tone and atmosphere similar to 1994′s Heavenly Creatures, but the whole production just gets away from him. The result is an emotionally empty film that wants to be important but instead comes as off creepier and more pointless than it means to be.

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