They had to balance his very human features and his very non-human features to create something that was both believable while also avoiding the uncanny valley. Caleb and the effects team’s work to bring Jeff to life was essential for this film to work. To bring all the animatronics to life, the film uses a combination of puppetry and what I assume was mo-cam work for Jeff. All of these features come together to make a film of incredible emotional depth. This is supported by the writing of Goodyear, creating a dog that was probably more intelligent than the norm. There is a bond both in the good and the bad which feels genuine, and this bond comes from performances that immediately feel right. Tom and Caleb work effortlessly together in this odd mentor/mentee, creation/creator, father/son, dynamic. This means the film has nowhere to hide, but because of this, they make every moment work. For all intents and purposes, there are only ever three characters in the movie. Where this film works, the best is in its intimacy. The fact that there is not stemmed from a lot of work from a lot of people across the runtime of the whole movie coming together. There would generally be extreme tonal whiplash in films like this. So even when you are having humorous moments between Finch and Jeff, this undercurrent is always here. Everything in this film is a last-ditch effort on his part to provide a future for Dog. A sorrow not from the fact that literally, everyone else is dead, but that it is apparent very early on that Finch is dying. There is a real odd tone with this film in that there is this deep undercurrent of sadness underneath everything. Tom Hanks gives a great performance of someone seeing the time drawing to a close.
So they all have to make a trip across the country to safety. It will last for over 40 days, 40 days too long. Things were going well until a supercell arrived. He has one mission, to finish building Jeff (Caleb Landry Jones) an android, so there would be someone to look after Goodyear/Dog (Seamus) after he was gone. One of the last people alive is Finch (Tom Hanks), who has survived in St Louis in the basement of the robotics company he worked at. This baked the planet, killing nearly all the plants, animals, and of course, humans. So to set the scene, in the not-so-distant future, a solar flare wiped away Earth’s ozone layer exposing the globe to a massive surge of radiation and also setting off a global EMP. Indeed, Tom Hanks is famous for playing a similar situation in Cast Away, so you knew it had to be an exciting premise to get him back into this realm. Fighting against the elements and even time to survive. Why they were left alone could be from them being forgotten, marooned, left behind, well, anything. Their road trip is paved with both challenges and humor, as it's as difficult for Finch to goad Jeff and Goodyear to get along as it is for him to manage the dangers of the new world.One genre I have always found interesting is that of the lone survivor.
As the trio embarks on a perilous journey into a desolate American West, Finch strives to show his creation, who names himself Jeff, the joy and wonder of what it means to be alive. He creates a robot, played by Caleb Landry Jones, to watch over Goodyear when he no longer can. But Finch, who has been living in an underground bunker for a decade, has built a world of his own that he shares with his dog, Goodyear.
Tom Hanks stars as Finch, a robotics engineer and one of the few survivors of a cataclysmic solar event that has left the world a wasteland. In "Finch," a man, a robot and a dog form an unlikely family in a powerful and moving adventure of one man's quest to ensure that his beloved canine companion will be cared for after he's gone.