gromeks-1 Reviews

The Piano Teacher (2001)

you guys make me laugh

[1/10 · 23 February 2006]

I love the way EVERY single review about this movie asserts that it has been misunderstood, that it is really obvious and pure genius but nobody noticed, etc. I love the way that everyone agrees on the fact that a movie has been "soooo misunderstood".

There is nothing worse than an American taking for granted that a movie is pure genius just because it is European ("where culture comes from, man"). It seems that these people feel obliged to love an Austrian movie so that they can show off in their entourage because they are the only ones actually knowing where Austria is.

I have just seen a opera in Paris directed by Haneke. Can you imagine Don Giovanni as ugly, dirty, perverse as Huppert in the pianist ? Well I say that Mozart's opera was spoiled. Haneke has an obvious problem, that is nor genius nor insanity. It is just lack of creativity. Everything he does is so purely literal, without an ounce of thought given to it, just raw. And the beauty of it is that he convinces some people that he is a genius. But the aforementioned people are not the sharpest tool in the box, far from it. They just tend to be snobs.

Laughable.

Where the Truth Lies (2005)

Want to know where the truth lies ?

[1/10 · 8 January 2006]

The two praising reviews I read about this movie forced me to react. I could not agree less with what was written. In my views, this movie could not have been any worse since, at the end of the day, it leaves the viewers with the impression, not only of having wasted both their time and money, but also of having been crooked.

The truth actually lies beneath: Some might interpret this as lack of subtlety or nuance, but, after having thought of this for a couple of hours, I could only come up with the conclusion that this movie is extremely poor in nearly every single way: the script is rather poor, the editing is artificial, misleading and annoying, the acting is extremely poor (at least as far as Alison Lohman is concerned), the music is banal, the costumes and the make up are off.

Indeed, the script is in fact frustratingly simple and should have been the object of a short: a young journalist investigates a crime and unveils the criminal after a couple of interviews. Furthermore, the ending, which reveals why the crime took place, leads to only one conclusion: much ado about nothing.

Secondly, Egoyan has obviously tried to hide the shallowness of the script by over-editing. Indeed, there are numerous flashbacks that obviously aim at making the plot more dense than it really is. In fact, they only make the story more difficult to understand, without making it more appealing.

The truth is that the ending does not surprise anyone, not only because it is not original, but above all because most viewers have lost interest after 40 minutes.

Indeed, they are introduced to a young journalist, Alison Lohman, who is, they are told, a young and unexperienced journalist who is given the task of drafting a one million dollars biography of a TV star. Besides the incongruity of such a situation (why an unexperienced journalist? why so much money for a TV star ? etc.), the extremely poor acting of Alison Lohman makes it difficult for the audience to feel any sympathy: when surprised, she frowns; when upset, she frowns; when aroused, disappointed, sympathizing, sad or happy, she frowns again - and again. Her obvious lack of talent is also exemplified by her off voice that is used all along the movie to explain to the lost audience what Egoyan is aiming at. She tries so hard to sound mysterious that it becomes laughable, especially since the suspense never catches the audience.

She also looks very sexy during the entire movie, for an unexplainable reason: whether at night or noon, whether in the presence of a man or a woman, she is constantly wearing low-cleavage dresses or robes, that are absolutely inappropriate with the situation and which make it even harder to believe. She also insists in typing her article with two inches-long nails which are, as everybody knows, the distinctive sign of a journalist.

Furthermore, during the entire movie, a very loud music, apparently composed exclusively for violins, attempts to increase the non-existing suspense. In fact, it is just plainly annoying.

Overall, the entire movie is extremely tacky, and the only reason for watching it would be the anatomy of Alison Lohman. But that is hardly enough to make a suitable non-pornographic movie.