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reknob
Reviews
The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Good cast wasted on a pointless and drab remake
Good cast without a doubt but where was:
The writing?
The screenplay?
The direction?
The editing?
The score? (was there one??)
Producers often get a bad rap for not doing anything and that's patently untrue in most cases but not here. Were they in Malibu the whole time?
This is so uniformly drab that I can only guess that nobody was really trying here and you can't hang it on the actors as they can only work with what they've been given and it's for everyone else to pull the whole thing together into something taut and worth watching and for producers to kick butt if they've enough experience to be able to tell if everyone else is even turning up to do a job every day while they're paying the bills.
I see no evidence of anyone being involved in this movie except the actors.
A terrible waste.
Mr. Robot (2015)
Dreadful
I tried to stick with this past the ludicrous casting (female "characters" in particular) but I've had to throw the towel in just recently.
I'm a software developer of some years myself and even I can't follow what the plot here is supposed to be - there appears to be basically no narrative arc or anything else to hold my interest at all.
What really throws this though is the utterly ludicrous female characters - these are supposed to be heavy techies or FBI agents etc and none of them look like they've eaten a solid meal in six months!
Add in the equally comical "United Nations" casting of the original hacking group members and I, literally, held my hand to my mouth to stifle my laughter at times ... I didn't spot a left-handed, one- legged scuba diving transsexual in that group but there must have been one somewhere!
If there are any female "hackers" out there in the real world, I can promise you they're going to be a size 16 instead of a size 0!
Quite how anyone involved with this production could think that wheeling out one skull-faced girl after another, in what's supposed to be an underground and highly skilled environment, was appropriate or believable in any way, shape or form I do not know.
If these girls were playing junkies then OK, I get it - emaciation etc is right on the money but otherwise, what the hell is wrong with them??
Sorry to see Christian Slater cameoing in this by the way - he deserves better but I can't blame him for the writing or the casting.
Dreadful.
The Martian (2015)
Ridley Scott does it again!
This is woeful ...
Appalling "script", no direction, incredible comedy casting, zero narrative tension - everything I've come to expect from a Ridley Scott "production" over the past decade ...
What on earth this guy is thinking and what people are seeing in his output I just do not know ...
A complete and utter waste of time - I'd be embarrassed to be involved with this and surely to God the talent that was involved in this latest wasterpiece of Ridley's will be steering clear of him in the future, it all beggars belief it really does ...
The Hateful Eight (2015)
Typical QT frustrating stuff
As always, there's good stuff here from QT but yet again, his indiscipline and self-indulgence drag this down to a 7 for me.
QT is an undoubtedly capable writer but he is constantly let down with both the editing and what seems to be weak direction with respect to forcing his actors to deliver in a particular manner.
Top of that list, I'm afraid, is Samuel L. Jackson who despite a generally good performance here, looks and sounds like he's just stepped out of 90's Compton and while that's always a problem for me in all his roles, it's all the more jarring in a period setting like this where all the other actors are delivering appropriate accents and mannerisms.
As for the other actors, they are uniformly terrific. Kurt Russell is always good value and I was delighted to see Bruce Dern here still showing he's got the acting chops and then some. Special mention should also go to Jennifer Jason Leigh who I thought led the bunch with QT quite clearly pushing her towards an Exorcist looking appearance - she was superb I thought and I could push her for a Best Supporting Actress nod here ...
I gather there's some fuss about the usage of the 'N' word here and while I think that's certainly an issue in the past, I don't have any problems with it in this setting. It's just post-Civil War for crying out loud and given the characters, it would seem inappropriate for that word *not* to be flung around all the time. Unfortunately, the issue I do have with it, and the 'MF' word is that yet again, Samuel L. Jackson is involved and I'm starting to have problems remembering a film where he *didn't* fling those words around all the time and it has become very, very off-putting for me and absolutely stops me from seeing him as anything else but Samuel L. Jackson, the guy who will look and sound the same in every film and you can bet your bottom Dollar that he'll be saying 'N' and 'MF' a lot, even if a film is set in 11th Century England ...
Clearly, the guy is doing well in terms of making money and getting into decent productions but I for one started avoiding his "work" some years ago because he ruins everything he's in for me - he's the black Keanu Reeves - I only managed to see this because of the amount of spare time I have over Xmas, otherwise I would have ducked it like all his other films ...
All in all, this is worth a watch but I wouldn't go out of my way to see it ...
Here's hoping that QT will, eventually, get a grip on himself and start making films that hit everyone in the right spot, not just himself and, presumably, his large gang of 20-something fans ...
Trumbo (2015)
Really good film
for those with any interest in the 50s/60s obsession with communism in the USA and for film buffs generally.
For sure it's also a more than worthwhile watch for those with no interest or knowledge of that era but if you do then you'll get so much more out of it.
A great performance by Cranston as Trumbo amongst a terrific cast and I'm so glad to see him finally get a decent leading part after his amazing work in Breaking Bad - some of those supporting roles he's done in films since have been somewhat embarrassing to my eyes, not his fault, as he's quite clearly an A-list actor who is capable of holding a leading role in his own right, as he does here.
The Revenant (2015)
Wow!
Every once in a while (about twice per decade, at best, I'd suggest) a film comes along that within the first few minutes you're thinking to yourself "I don't want this to end ..." and this is one of those oh-so-rare productions - absolutely magnificent in every respect.
It will for sure be a love/hate film for the wider audience (this most certainly ain't a rom-com girls so ...) and the stupids will doubtless be very, very bored after the first half an hour but if you like "proper" films and appreciate cinematography and top-notch acting in a gritty and (very) grim context then this is for you.
As the other guy suggests - stop reading this, go put your hand in your pockets and pay to go see it where it should be seen on a big screen at the cinema; this is one of those twice-per-decade films that *must* be seen that way ...
Big respect and thanks go to all concerned with making this cinematic triumph.
Sicario (2015)
Who gave this the green light??
This is an 8/10 film dragged down to a 5/10 by the inclusion of Emily Blunt's "character" in the screenplay.
I have no understanding whatsoever what the execs/director/writer were thinking when including her whiny-ass, *unbelievably* naïve character in this otherwise really good film but boy did they trash it by her inclusion.
Notwithstanding the amount of disbelief suspension required to think she could ever be a FBI/SWAT team member (never mind leader!!) with her 90lbs frame but she goes one further by doing things like checking a dead guy for a pulse with her leather gloves still on (two minutes into the film!) just to ensure that your jaw slacks open at the seeming incongruousness of all the good things you've heard about this film vs her character (stick thin female/pointless and distracting character) contributing absolutely nothing to it and she's in your face throughout the film - mindboggling ...
Take her out of it and add a few more minutes with the rest of the cast and you're onto a winner cos the rest of it is just great, cinematography and direction in particular but well, I don't know what else to say ...
I'm not hating on Blunt cos her performance is fine but she should never have made it past the first draft of this write-up; there's just zero interest here in her character and you just have to think that it's just yet another example of Hollywood's obsession with squeezing in a female character (almost always to the detriment of everything else) to satisfy the focus groups/wtf-ever but that's usually a token "supporting" (LOL!) character, not the ostensible lead in a film ...
This is a film that should never have had a lead cos the story *is* the lead - Blunt appears to have been tacked on as an afterthought and ultimately it trashes what could have been a well made film with a great cast ...
A real shame and yet more evidence of some staggeringly inept writing decisions coming out of Hollywood these days ...
The Man in the High Castle (2015)
Awful low budget waste of a good book/plot
Typical of many/all endeavours involving Ridley Scott during the last decade or two, this is a shoddy effort by all concerned.
Quite unbelievably low budget for a modern TV series, it's exceptionally hard to get yourself immersed in what is a terrific scenario from Philip K. Dick's book because of that but also because of the, again, common to almost everything Ridley Scott is involved with these days, terrible writing, quite the worst I've witnessed in some time.
Such a waste this - you can get by with 'B' rated actors if the production quality and/or writing standards are up to snuff but none of them are here and there's basically no direction going on either - almost every "performance" from top to bottom here was sent in by post ...
If this is how Amazon think they can compete with Netflix then they need to think again - this is Sci-Fi Channel standard output ...
Interstellar (2014)
Awful
I'm supposed to detail my thoughts on the movie here but frankly, I don't know where to begin.
There's just so much wrong here that I can't prioritise it all but here goes: Sound: Horrible, horrible noise throughout the film rendering much of the dialogue unintelligible. What on earth were they thinking? Acting: I love McConaughey and he does his best to instil some emotion in here to make up for the total "care?" engendered by the pitiful script but he can't do it all on his own and the female lead with the I'm-so-cute big eyes was dreadful throughout.
Writing/screenplay: Well, again, I don't know where to begin but as with most poor movies, this is the real culprit here. I'm just not sure at which point I was supposed to actually give a toss about any of the characters or get caught up in what was happening on screen.
For a film set in inter-galactic travel, the suggestion is that the sum total of wild and whacky differences between worlds other than ours is that they may have big waves in their seas or it may be really cold. OK, colour my imagination fully filled lol, Jesus wept, that's it? That's the grand vision of the other side of the universe fulfilled is it? Again, this is supposed to be a story of big ideas and concepts so why do we have to sit through half an hour plus of setting up an utterly superfluous bad guy replete with pointless (and hysterically funny - to me at least) fight between guys in space suits? What, if any, was the point of all of that? True or false, this would be a better film with all of the Matt Damon stuff taken out and indeed that entire planet's involvement - mindboggling.
I'm not even going to go there on the pseudo-science. I'm a sci-fi fan and I'm happy to let my imagination run to keep myself in the story but you've got to make at least some effort. The complete cr*p coming out of the actor's mouths in much of this film was just embarrassing, so bloody low brow, I imagine the more intelligent amongst them must have had trouble keeping a straight face at times.
I haven't had the misfortune to suffer through such atrocious writing since Prometheus and clearly, Nolan is well on the way to becoming the new Ridley Scott. Good with smaller budget films where he may actually put a shift in but appalling when larging it around with big budget "blockbusters" sh*te like these - what a complete and utter waste of time, money and talent on films that nobody is ever going to watch again ...
Dreadful.
Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014)
An absolute treat
I loved this from start to finish.
Hardly your typical cinema fare, this will leave much of the average cinema goer bored I would imagine.
Simply put, if you enjoy the theatre then you will almost certainly love this, not just because it's set in a theatre but because that dividing line of demographics is more or less accurate in terms of who will lover/hate this work ...
I can't recommend this highly enough and how about the length of some of those shots?!
Top work.
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1 (2014)
They're getting worse
I liked the first film (8/10), thought the second film was very average (6/10) and this is a generous 5/10.
There's no point going into detail but suffice to say that everything here is very weak indeed and I felt sorry for the great Jenny Lawrence trying her best with this appalling non-script that persists in suggesting that her character could have any feelings towards the pipsqueak Peter character .
It's just not a believable romantic thread ...
Jenny and Julianne could both find better work than this.
Very poor indeed ...
Under the Skin (2013)
A perfect 10 and here's why
I cannot recall a piece of work like this in my 40+ years of film viewing.
There is absolutely nothing being sold to you here. It is what it is and it's left, almost, entirely up to you to make what you will of it.
Hence the 10/10.
There's no way I can critique or score this on any metrics I'd normally use as they're simply not relevant. This film critiques and scores you, not the other way around ...
Kubrick? Well indeed, that guy's movies are riddled with a cold, unemotional "matter of factness" that leave them embedded in your mind for decades afterwards but this is on another level entirely.
Being set in a Wintery Scotland didn't happen by chance, it matches the film's tone perfectly and, if you can, it's worth trying to watch it in a cold environment - that's the level of immersion on offer here but only if you can handle it (few will).
How on earth this film ever got made I don't know, there's no way in hell it would ever get a green light in Hollywood so you have to give it up to all concerned as it's an absolutely stunning achievement.
Scarlett Johansson puts in a pitch-perfect performance and I for one was glad to see some female nudity portrayed by someone who looks like she'd eaten a proper meal recently - all the more reason to give her credit in my opinion.
In an industry obsessed with horrific stick-thin women, that wasn't lost on me and I think it was very brave of her to do what she did here. I don't like it when actresses do makeup and perfume adverts as I feel it diminishes their credibility as artists (and promotes them as just-another-painted-wh*re) and I was disappointed to see Scarlett in one of those but she more than claws back the respect with this effort ...
If you liked Only God Forgives then try this for size but be warned, it makes that, wonderful, film feel like an Eddie Murphy effort ...
Utopia (2013)
So subversive I'm surprised it got made
I haven't experienced a piece of work this subversive since, well, maybe ever but at least the early 1980s.
Just about every government-level conspiracy theory is covered here with absolutely no punches pulled whatsoever - this is seriously hard hitting stuff and not for the weak of mind.
Terrific writing and some outstanding acting performances combine with a really "weird" vibe to produce a work so well crafted that it's up there with early Ridley Scott efforts in my opinion.
I gather this is being remade for American TV with David Fincher directing the pilot - I would be absolutely astounded if it isn't watered down for airing over there as it's way, way too close to the knuckle re many US, er, "incidents" of the last few decades ...
American Hustle (2013)
6-8/10 depending on your mood/intoxication levels
This is an exceptionally difficult film to score - there's lots to like here and lots to loathe.
Arguably, the same could be said for Wolf of Wall Street except the editing here, though not great, isn't up to the tragedy level of WoWS (did they cut *anything* from that film???) so there's still stuff in here that coulda/shoulda been cut or improved.
The script, like the acting and the direction is both good and bad at times and how much you are affected by the good/bad on offer here will be totally down to personal sensitivities and will make this either a completely ordinary or a reasonably entertaining experience for you.
For me, both Cooper and Bale were outshone by their female counterparts - Cooper I found intensely irritating throughout - Bale's role is by necessity less showy but it's a mixed performance for me with elements of his Patrick Bateman performance showing through all the extra hair, makeup and glasses etc.
Amy Adams is extremely sexy to be sure but the director spends so much time luxuriating over her body (and for some reason her legs and feet - perhaps he shares my fetish ...) that anything that may be notable about her performance was lost to me.
The real acting kudos here goes to Jennifer Lawrence who I think stood out in almost every scene she was in and I'll be looking out for her future work ...
All in all, this is worth a view but you probably want to leave your brain at the entrance and pick it back up on the way out ...
Like many "big" films recently, the general standard of how well the film was *crafted* seems to have slumped to levels I've not seen since the late 1970s.
This is something I've witnessed in films like Gatsby(what the hell?? Awful!!), Wolf of Wall Street (45 minutes of worthy stuff stretched out for three hours) and 12 Years a Slave (decent but massively over-hyped with a weak script) - is it all getting just a bit too easy for folks up in Hollywood these days cos someone, somewhere, sitting atop this stuff is falling short in their duty imo ...
August: Osage County (2013)
Gobsmackingly good
This is an exceptionally challenging film and most won't be able to stay with it as it hurtles, repeatedly, from hysterical comedy to blackest tragedy in almost the same breath - the term "tragicomedy" never fit a film so well ...
There are some stupendous performances here, Meryl Streep in particular but Roberts is outstanding too amongst a superb ensemble cast - the script is firecrackingly terrific and the (less is more when you've got this much going on ...) direction is perfect too ...
You know something? I'm a 48 year old guy with way over a thousand films under my belt and this may well creep into my all-time top 10, it's that good ...
10
The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
Oh dear
WoWS, along with 12 Years, is hugely overrated and quite clearly is simply a poor man's "Goodfellas in Wall Street" - there's simply no narrative arc here at all, did they even leave a single shot on the editing room floor to get this to three hours??? Massively bloated, zero narrative tension, embarrassingly rip-off style to Goodfellas - good performance from Di Caprio of course who is a fine actor though this must be his 19th film on the trot playing some rich guy; seriously Leo, you need to start picking scripts ala Clooney cos you're chucking away what could be a fine career on *pointless* stuff such as WoWS and the awful Gatsby ...
5/10 - nothing in it to hate but hardly anything in it to really like (other than lots and lots and lots of T&A and drug taking but you can't have a film consisting of that and virtually nothing else and WoWS proves it ...).
12 Years a Slave (2013)
Colour me underwhelmed
There are things to like here for sure but I doubt this rates in my top three all-time black slavery movies ...
A stellar cast but mediocre screenplay/script leave this as an average watch and I'm not sure what this adds to the (ever increasing) back catalogue of black slavery movies ...
The main problem for me I think is that Patsey (a young female black slave who is whipped to within an inch of her life and repeatedly sexually assaulted by her owner and then picked on/assaulted by the owner's jealous wife, again, repeatedly) goes through 1000x more pain, humiliation and suffering than the main character does and she's left behind for more of the same no doubt until her dying day whilst he's back in New York having been freed to go back to his spoilt bunny lifestyle - where's the narrative drama there? All I cared about was Patsey who he, apparently, left to suffer until her dying day even after she begged him to kill her ...
PS: Brad Pitt's role towards the end of the movie was really offputting - sorry Brad but you can't be who/what you are and just turn up at the end of the film and not expect to throw the whole thing off-kilter, Fassbender must have been really p*ssed cos there's really no point even trying to do anything with your own performance if you're then going to roll in at the end with your Quaker beard and being Brad Pitt n all and tossing the audience's immersion out of the window - you're like one step away from being Troy McLure my friend, even if you are "producing" the movie ...
Man of Steel (2013)
Religion + politics = politics
I was reminded of the above quote whilst watching Man of Steel.
TV (actors/writers/directors) + movie = TV. Or at best, a 'B' movie.
With a budget of $225m you have to think that $200m of that was spent on the CGI leaving $25m to write, direct, edit, and act out a "movie".
Respect to Ben Affleck who turned down directing the film: "A lesson I've learned is to not look at movies based on budget, how much they'll spend on effects or where they will shoot. Story is what's important."
There are things to like in this for sure, assuming you're a Superman fanboy and/or 12 years old that is but in terms of the standards (barely kept these days ...) of writing, acting, directing and editing (was there any???) required to make a real movie it's actually quite embarrassing to watch, incohesive and, frankly, boring for long periods - how many fight scenes between indestructible characters can you have in one movie for God's sake??!!
It's also somewhat stupefying to believe that it actually made it to the big screen - 20 years ago this would most definitely have been a "straight to video" release and it ranks up there with recent gobsmackingly poor efforts such as The Great Gatsby and Trance.
While I can understand the cast of TV actors wanting a part in this to get themselves onto the big screen alongside the likes of (the *incredibly* overrated) Russell Crowe, you do have to wonder just how much benefit their careers will get from being involved in such a poorly executed project - for sure they'll have made a few quid but none of these guys are short of cash anyway I wouldn't have thought!
Whilst Henry Cavill can be forgiven for taking the opportunity to land a "big lead", I'm staggered that someone of the calibre of Richard Schiff would get involved in something like this - was there even a script ahead of signing these people up??!! Oh and don't even get me started on I'm-so-fat-I-can't-even-run-anymore Fishburne lol
While I've been delighted to see the standards of TV dramas rocket in the past decade or so, almost to the point of good movie making standards, this type of travesty is a clear indication that there are clear limits to what can be achieved when attempting to merge the two formats.
This felt like an attempt to cram a season or two of a typical TV series into a (impossible to justify given the "content") 2 and a half hour movie.
What's quite telling is that in the effort to use TV standards to make a movie, this has actually not only fallen way short of being a viable movie but it also pales next to the plethora of quality TV dramas we've been treated to recently.
On that basis, I can only hope that this attempt to merge the two formats (ala games and movies anyone??) will quickly die away and we can continue with, the very occasional, great modern movie and more terrific TV dramas but on this evidence, never the twain shall meet!
Trance (2013)
Absolutely appalling
Just because a movie is confusing doesn't mean it's a bad movie but in this case it's both confusing and a very, very bad movie.
I can't think of a single thing i like about it - appalling script, horrific miscasting, horrible lighting, terrible music and a I-don't-care-about-anyone "plot" ...
I feel sorry for Rosario Dawson, talk about the wrong movie to get your kit off in ...
Little wonder that Fassbender suddenly had a "scheduling conflict" and ducked the film, presumably after receiving the script, he's way past being involved in amateurish (in absolutely every respect) rubbish like this ...
I'd be surprised if a talented guy like Boyle put more than a weekend's effort into making this, nothing worked or had any credibility whatsoever ...
Prometheus (2012)
RIP Ridley Scott the film maker
I shan't compare this to other "Alien" movies because, frankly, I think it's irrelevant.
I shall, however, judge it as a film on its own merits.
This is a very, very poorly made film.
The narrative arc (is there one??)/script are wholly lacking, there are GAPING holes left all over the place such that quality actors have to deliver CRINGEWORTHY exposition lines to let you know what the hell is going on. Nor is there any sense of discovery here at all which is absolutely criminal given the synopsis. The pacing, or lack of it, never once let's you settle into any kind of immersive atmosphere, save perhaps for the first 30 minutes or so.
Fassbender (especially) and Rapace are the standouts here, everyone else would have served the film better if they had simply not turned up for shooting so they could be scrubbed from the "script". I'm not having a go at the supporting actors as they can only work with what they've been given but honestly, there are quality actors here having to deliver truly embarrassing work.
Are there good things here? Yes, visually, at times, it is stunning although the too-fast pacing often sees incredible imagery on screen for painfully short periods crushing your immersion. Also, the one stand-out scene left me reeling and bonding with Rapace's character - the only time I felt tension and horror during the entire film. The first thirty minutes or so are spell-binding including the introduction to Fassbender's character who we see watching a legendary movie (also a personal favourite of mine and one in which the main character is also on a journey of self-discovery).
However, from thirty minutes in, it's all downhill.
I cannot for the life of me understand how Ridley Scott let this film get away from him so badly.
Scott made his name with his first three films, showing stupendous ability at creating immersive atmospheres with exquisite attention to detail - The duellists, Alien and Bladerunner. These are films that I watch at least twice per year.
The fact that he since went down the Hollywood blockbuster route has been of constant disappointment to me. While he likely ballooned his own net worth, in my opinion he has created nothing of much worth for anybody else since, certainly nothing towards the art of film making. OK, so he went for money and ego instead of craft and art, it's his life and his choice but I never thought that he would treat a legacy such as Alien with such consummate disrespect - this is shameful work from someone who, at least used to be, capable of so much more ...
I would like to think that this film was destroyed in the editing room and that there's 20 minutes or so of "extra" narrative-laden material that was dumped for the oh-so-superfluous "action" scenes that made it to the final cut. Swap those in on a Bluray Director's Cut (sic) and maybe this can be lifted from its theatrical release level of shame ...
The Tree of Life (2011)
Not for those short on brainpower or imagination
Malick outdoes himself with this stunning and very sensitive effort.
If, like me, you often choose movies to see based on a high critical score combined with a low score from the general public, then this will be right up your street.
If, however, you are similar in mindset to the general populous, haven't seen 500 movies, read 50 books or have a sub-120 IQ then trust me, you're probably not in a position to get anything out of seeing this.
Personally, seeing this made me feel better about myself and my life, knowing there are other people who even think at this level, never mind having the ability to get a movie like this actually made.
Thank the lord for Terrence Mallick...
Truly sublime.
Pan Am (2011)
Cheaply made girly soap opera rubbish
I'm sooo disappointed in this, I really am.
I had to stifle laughter often during the first few episodes - the "Captain" of the crew is about 25 years old for crying out loud! He and his co-pilot looking at each other laughing during take-off etc, I mean for God's sake!
The "spy" stuff is just beyond belief, I mean, talk about being desperate for writing material!
This is only good for your average 90 IQ girls, I can't believe any men would give this more than an episode or two before wanting a refund on their wasted time. SOME of the girls look good but you really won't want to be following the well-worn soap opera "plot lines" (basically weddings and romance and girls falling out with girls and boys and mothers and etc etc *YAWNATHON*).
It's utterly pointless and the "Pan Am" setting could be anything, there's nothing here that is specific to Pan Am at all, it's purely a glamorous setting of convenience ...
Turn the sound down (noone has anything interesting to say, ever), put on a favourite album and enjoy what (little, really) eye candy there is but seriously, for all but the braindead amongst us, this shouldn't even be in the top ten of your watch list.
What was Christina Ricci thinking??!!
What a waste ...
The Borgias (2011)
What a waste
This is a purely cookie-cutter period drama from Showtime once again.
The Tudors (also Showtime) seasons 1-2 was very good but from season 3 onwards, everyone was mailing in their performances and the writing was perfunctory at best.
The Borgias is definitely on a par with the latter - they've merely swapped some of the character and place names etc to come up with this "new" production.
The only character of genuine interest is Micheletto, the assassin; every scene with him is a whole cut above the average.
How I can be saying this when we're talking about a period of legendarily scandalous behaviour in the heart of the Vatican being portrayed by some top-drawer actors is beyond me and I am terribly disappointed to be doing it.
I don't know whether it's the writing and/or direction that is at fault here (I can't really blame the actors as they have little/nothing to work with) but this is a really wasted opportunity to put out some high quality drama for once.
Very disappointing.
Far from Heaven (2002)
Great story, average movie
I love movies set in 50s America and this looked fabulous.
I had high expectations of this given the (current) 7.9 rating here on IMDB although it's interesting to see that US voters rate it significantly higher than non-US voters although I suspect that's a common trait with very 'American' movies.
Anyway, a great story along with fine acting but for me this is a 'drama' without drama. This movie has a '12A' rating in the UK and I suspect that is part of the problem. The story gives ample scope for people letting rip given the strain that they are under but with 12 year olds in the audience a lot of it is soft-peddled and the movie suffers greatly for that.
Also, to say the direction was 'flat' would be an understatement. I'm sure this looked great on paper but little was done to 'lift' it onto the big screen. Again, maybe the '12A' rating had a lot to do with that but I have to admit that this movie felt like the longest 1 3/4 hours movie I'd ever watched and more like something you'd see that was 'made for TV'.
Still worth a look though for the way it looks at least.
7/10