Imbued with a mysterious undercurrent and filled with memorable images the film is certainly a visually immersive experience with strong performances all around, but the film’s slow pacing and slightly disjointed editing prevent the film from being a more cohesive whole and making a stronger impact at its crescendo.
A superficial scrutiny of The Best Offer might assert it to be a slightly unpalatable story of love-across the-age-divide between Virgil Oldman (Geoffrey Rush), successful antique art auctioneer with his own priceless collection of female portraits, and Claire Ibbetson (Sylvia Hoeks), twenty something agoraphobic orphan of life-long antique collectors.
Ashton Kutcher is a revelation in the titular role, his performance is subtle and nuanced, a major divide from the usual, manic performances he delivers. He has the awkward, stilted, hunched swagger down to a fine art.
To the trained eye, however, this is not your average foreign film. As refreshing as it is to watch a story seen through the eyes of a Lao child, one can’t help but sense the script was not written by a local.
Imagine watching some of most breathtaking scenes on earth – a flock of flamingoes flying over a lake; sub-Saharan African tribes performing a traditional dance ceremony; American skyscrapers reflecting light off one another. Now imagine somebody taking that footage, and editing it on Windows Movie Maker.
It would be easy to dismiss this as an $84 million waste of time. Going with the motto, ‘bigger is better’, Red 2 (penned by Jon and Erich Hoeber and based on Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner’s Marvel characters) can never be accused of being dull or slow, but they might have gone a bit too big.
Responding to the recent economic disaster in his home country of Hungary and its effects on his film industry, director György Pálfi has made…
Based on the bestselling books by Cassandra Clare and adapted to screen by Jessica Postigo, the story depicts a fantasy flipside of New York called Downworld, where Shadowhunters battle demons, and wizards, werewolves and vampires coexist (not zombies though).
Upstream Color isn’t a film for the casual movie goer, but those that like more intellectually engaging movies, and willing to be challenged by alternative form and narrative, will be significantly rewarded by this daring, original and heartfelt film.
Loosely based on Henry James’ 1897 novel of the same name, What Maisie Knew is the story of a young girl whose world is…