The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is a 2008 American romantic fantasy drama film directed by David Fincher.

The film stars Brad Pitt as a man who ages in reverse and Cate Blanchett as the love interest throughout his life.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button was released in North America on December 25, 2008 to positive reviews, with major praise for Fincher's directing, Pitt's performance, production values, and visual effects.

His mother, Caroline, dies soon after childbirth and his father, wealthy manufacturer Thomas Button, abandons him on the porch of a nursing home.

Producer Ray Stark bought the film rights to do The Curious Case of Benjamin Button in the mid-1980s, and it was optioned by Universal Pictures.

Stark eventually sold the rights to producers Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall, who took the film to Paramount Pictures, with Universal still on as a co-production partner.

In October 1998, screenwriter Robin Swicord wrote for director Ron Howard an adapted screenplay of the short story, a project which would potentially star actor John Travolta.

[8] In June 2003, director Gary Ross entered final negotiations to helm the project based on a new draft penned by screenwriter Eric Roth.

[13] The following October, with production yet to begin, Julia Ormond was cast as Daisy's daughter, to whom Blanchett's character tells the story of her love for Benjamin Button.

He co-starred with Ormond in Legends of the Fall, with Flemyng in Snatch, with Jared Harris in Ocean's Twelve, with Blanchett in Babel and with Swinton in Burn After Reading.

For Benjamin Button, New Orleans, Louisiana and the surrounding area was chosen as the filming location for the story to take advantage of the state's production incentives, and shooting was slated to begin in October 2006.

[18] Fincher praised the ease of accessibility to rural and urban sets in New Orleans and said that the recovery from Hurricane Katrina did not serve as an atypical hindrance to production.

[20] The director used a camera system called Contour, developed by Steve Perlman, to capture facial deformation data from live-action performances.

The train station was built as a 3D model and lighting and aging effects were added, using Next Limit's Maxwell rendering software—an architectural visualization tool.

The consensus reads: "Curious Case of Benjamin Button is an epic fantasy tale with rich storytelling backed by fantastic performances.

[36][37] Kirk Honeycutt of The Hollywood Reporter felt the film was "superbly made and winningly acted by Brad Pitt in his most impressive outing to date."

Honeycutt praised Fincher's directing of the film and noted that the "cinematography wonderfully marries a palette of subdued earthen colors with the necessary CGI and other visual effects that place one in a magical past."

Honeycutt states the bottom line about Benjamin Button is that it is "an intimate epic about love and loss that is pure cinema.

Scott praised Fincher and writes "Building on the advances of pioneers like Steven Spielberg, Peter Jackson and Robert Zemeckis, Mr. Fincher has added a dimension of delicacy and grace to digital filmmaking" and further states: "While it stands on the shoulders of breakthroughs like Minority Report, The Lord of the Rings and Forrest Gump, Benjamin Button may be the most dazzling such hybrid yet, precisely because it is the subtlest."

"[39] On the other hand, Anne Hornaday of The Washington Post states: "There's no denying the sheer ambition and technical prowess of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.

"[40] Kimberley Jones of the Austin Chronicle panned the film and stated, "Fincher's selling us cheekboned movie stars frolicking in bedsheets and calling it a great love.

... the movie's premise devalues any relationship, makes futile any friendship or romance, and spits, not into the face of destiny, but backward into the maw of time.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is an anodyne Hollywood film that offers a safe and sanitised view of life and death.

In terms of the basic requirements of three-reel drama the film lacks substance, credibility, a decent script and characters you might actually care for.

Taraji P. Henson won Best Actress at the BET Awards for her role in the film combined with two other performances in Not Easily Broken, and The Family That Preys.