Never, quite possibly, in the history of the American cinema has a bigger, baggier monster been brought to birth and flourishing -- thirteen Academy Award nominations! -- from a more nugatory source than The Curious Case of Benjamin Button . Scott Fitzgerald's short story of 1920 is the slightest of jeux d'esprit , an avowed "experiment" based on Mark Twain's observation that it is a pity that the best part of life comes first and the worst last. To Fitzgerald, this proved the excuse for a joke, and a very slight one. In my edition of his short stories, the editor, Matthew Bruccoli, apologizes for that slightness by writing that, as he and (presumably) Fitzgerald see it, "the challenge of fantasy is to make impossible events convincing." Not anymore it isn't! It's simply to revel in the fantasy and convincing be damned -- which I, for one, don't call much of a challenge. It should not be surprising, then, that o...