This is one of those gleefully macabre movies that upon reading the premise you know exactly who the director is. Yes, it’s David Cronenberg again proving that his oddball interests are not only weirder than yours, he’ll make a film about them.
Two Jeremy Irons for the price of one, and this is the only time he’s gone nuts in a movie. These days, he’s your token British supporting bore. He turns up and he’s the same in every film, phoning it in.
A shame.
Well, this was quite remarkable and I’m shocked it wasn’t shite because the picture stank of ‘Oscar bait’.
It probably was made with that at least in mind but it’s quality, nonetheless.
And Michael Shannon once again steals the movie.
I do hope to never view this film again. This is not because it is in any way rubbish; the images are striking, the story clenching you from the off. It’s brilliant but oh so brutal, an exercise in putting the viewer through the Victorian wringer. And the protagonist manages to be both monstrous and worthy of your sympathy at the same time, a bona fide Lady Macbeth, I suppose. She reminded me of a far less avuncular, much more sinister approximation of Clint Eastwood’s quote in Gran Torino (2008) when he declares, “Ever notice how you come across somebody once in a while you shouldn’t have fucked with? That’s me.”
Just don’t bother with the popcorn for this one.
It kicks off with a most annoying opening to the extent that even the presentation of the credits pissed me off. Beyond this bad omen, the critter at least was a cute wee hippo … thing, but this aside it was simply too much of an effort to follow what was happening. It was also unnecessarily loud, a bombardment of racket. Remove the elephant/pig/hippo creature and it’s just needless noise. Boring.
I wouldn’t bother.
And it’s not even good, not a smidgen of “timeless classic” going on, another nostalgia viewing regret.
I don’t understand the point of any of it, or why they are even trying to find the body (the “we’ll be heroes” motivation makes no sense). The voice over is entirely unnecessary, each schematic vignette increasingly dull, and the direction heavy handed and tepid.
I simply wasn’t buying it, my annoyance at the characters’ antics only matched by the disappointment I had in myself for watching their needy antics despite being bored shitless.
Coming-of-age rubbish.
The director here can direct like the bloke who constructed The Wicker Man (1973) can, and I’m not alluding to Nicolas Cage and “the bees”.
Quite the captivating drama this one, featuring the usual committee of elders/morons, the martyr lead, and your go-to religious allegories, but it’s done so well. It’s more watchable than Persona (1966), and definitely less irritating.
That’s it for the spoilers.
It started so well and the jam they are in certainly has its enthralling moments initially but the series soon ran out of ideas, each successive sticky situation more risible and repetitive. Though the characters remain credible, their incessant switching allegiances started to grind my gears, and so too did Laura Linney’s Lady Macbeth impersonation; probably the most embarrassing I’ve seen, I’ve been more terrified of an unflushed shite in a KFC.
There isn’t really anyone worth caring about, especially as they all get increasingly Walter White. Unlike Breaking Bad, this, aside from a bit of Harris Yulin banter, is bereft of humour of any kind.
The most vexing: the characters’ addiction to addressing one another by name EVERY FUCKING SENTENCE.
“Listen, Marty.”
“I am listening, Wendy.”
“I don’t think you are, Marty.”
No one speaks like this.
Like the later seasons of House of Cards (US), I lost interest in everything so committed the Wikipedia thing.
No regrets.
Certainly ambitious in conception, but it all feels so rehashed and by the numbers, kind of half-baked and jaded by its own pretensions.
There are moments when you think it’s finally going to throw off the shackles and descend into proper depravity and capture the macabre, but it never does, like it’s constrained by committee. And there’s not enough of a portrait of Oktoberfest or Munich or … Germany in general, and those times were wicked times.
I was expecting a Bavarian Red Wedding. It never happened. Plenty of beer, but not enough blood.
Oh well, the intention was there.
Shockingly (for me as I’ve catalogued most of these ’80s classics) I’d never seen this until last week. It could be made today, that’s how ‘undated’ it is. What an experience – genuinely a hoot and wholly relatable. We’ve all been stuck next to some annoying blabbermouth on what seems like a never-ending journey into the abyss. And who can’t relate to a transportation fiasco.
It’s also a subtle portrayal of class, the difficulties of breaking barriers, and ultimately and reluctantly working together to get where you need to be. A life lesson! This should be screened at office training days or something.
One scene came out of nowhere in its profanity, and it’s quite the spectacle seeing Steve Martin finally crack. He wasn’t going to intimate that rental agent, but he did a wonderful job in articulating the pain of dealing these sorts.
First-class movie.
In the midst of a global pandemic as it grabs peak humanity by the testicles, I sat down to watch 12 Monkeys (1995) again after a decade-long hiatus. And what smashing, thought-provoking, thoroughly enthralling sci-fi it is, a Terry Gilliam movie that isn’t uneven and all over the place, which basically makes it an anomaly. 1995 was kind to movies, and Bruce Willis was at his peak in the year of the Eric Cantona kung-fu kick.
There is a mind-blowing scene in this set on the Western Front during WWI; it is so magnificent that it almost derails the rest of the film. However, the character dynamics and pacing manage to keep it together and build to a stunning denouement, that and the inspired Vertigo (1958) references.
And this is one of the few movies that actually depicts people in ‘mental hospitals’ or ‘institutions’ as actually having meaningful, occasionally profound insights into the peculiarities of the social order.
And seek out its art-farty precursor La Jetée (1962). It’s definitely not shite.
Wanderings and ... wonderings. 