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Reviews
Eismayer (2022)
missing details
Some films are frustrating because the director lingers on every scene for too long after making their point. This film has the opposite problem: too much is left unsaid/unexplained. Dramatic scenes are cut short and the plot moves on with the viewer wondering exactly what happened. For example:
- we get very little of Eismayer's backstory, which would have helped us to understand why he was so macho
- despite being a fitness fanatic and having cancer, why does Eismayer smoke so much? And how does he survive?
- why was Falak so afraid to cross the bridge and what exactly happened when they both fell in the water?
- how and when did Eismayer fall in love with Falak?
- what did Falak see in a much older guy who displays almost no kindness or tenderness (except toward his son)?
- how did the wife deal with her husband finally admitting he was gay?
- what was the repeated scene of the abandoned building in winter meant to symbolise/represent?
Maybe there were lots of subtle signs that I missed (please don't shoot me) but, most importantly, the overall effect on me was that the romance seemed to come out of nowhere and develop very quickly, for reasons that were hard to understand.
Nevertheless, I thought the film was well-acted and well-made. The crowd-pleasing happy ending is well done and not over-done. Still, the film could have been a much more in-depth character study of the two men and the relationship between them.
Efterforskningen (2020)
Slow and plodding, like its subject-matter
Yes, the film is a great exposition of how proving a criminal case can involve countless hours of painstaking work by dedicated and hard-working police officers. But is it good entertainment? Not for me. So many scenes were too long, advanced the plot only millimetres (if at all) and involved naturalistic but plodding dialogue. If it hadn't been for curiosity about how they eventually proved the murder, I wouldn't have lasted to the end.
It's one thing to base a drama on a true story, but you still have to make it interesting and avoid repetition. I lost count of how many scenes involved a main character repeatedly stating the obvious e.g. The head diver saying their task was like looking for a needle in a haystack, or the prosecutor saying he needed the evidence to prove the case.
The lead character's expressionless stoicism also didn't help me to engage with the story. More focus on the effect of the case on the character's private lives would have been welcome, but the lead character's strained relationship with his daughter seemed like a forced addition to me.
Chopping it down to a two-hour telemovie would have made it an engaging thriller, instead of a being a 4.5-hour quasi-documentary.
Bacurau (2019)
Too many unanswered questions
This film was clearly very well made and kept my interest and attention throughout. But I couldn't rate it higher than a six because I found all the gruesome violence too much to handle and because I left with far too many unanswered questions. Exactly who was the group of foreigners and were they just killing for sport? Who were their Brazilian accomplices and how was the mayor involved? What exactly was the problem with the water? What had Lunga done to make him go into hiding? How can such a small village support full-time prostitutes? What was the director trying to say? Like an abstract painting in a gallery which requires you to read 5 paragraphs of text to fully understand and appreciate it, there was just too much about this film that I didn't 'get'. For me, it's OK to generate an air of mystery so long as most of the audience's questions are answered by the end of the film. Not so in this case.
Bikes vs Cars (2015)
Interesting but disappointing snapshot
This documentary focuses on the human stories behind the issue of using bikes rather than cars in large, modern cities. The main focus is on Sao Paolo and Los Angeles but there are excursions to Bogota, Berlin, Copenhagen and Toronto, which are not well connected to the main stories. The interviewees's stories are interesting and they are articulate, but there is only one expert to give a more general or academic viewpoint. The presentation is very one-sided, with car-drivers not really given a fair shot, and a lone taxi-driver in Copenhagen left to complain about bike riders making life difficult for car drivers. A huge omission is China, where cities are coming to grips with probably the earth's most rapid transition from bikes to cars. Overall, interesting and well-filmed as far as it goes, but far from being a balanced or rigorous treatment of an important issue.
The Rugby Player (2013)
Too long and personal
This documentary is about the life of Mark Bingham, a gay rugby player and passenger on Flight 93 on September 11, 2001. It is narrated almost entirely by Mark's mother Alice and various other family members and friends. Alice and Mark clearly had a very strong bond and Alice is engaging and articulate. However, for me, too much of the movie was devoted to Mark's childhood and adolescence, including things like his tastes in music and his student pranks. It began to feel like a very personal movie, more about Mark as a son and friend, rather than as a person of interest to others. As an outsider, I was interested in the two aspects of Mark's life that make him an interesting character: being a gay man in the ultra-masculine sport of rugby, and being a passenger with the courage to rebel against the hijackers on the doomed plane. Mark is, of course, not able to tell his version of events, which for me was a big weakness in the film. Technically, it is well put together, and the editors have done a good job melding a dizzying amount of home movie footage, much of it taken by Mark himself, into a cohesive story. Still, it would have made a better one-hour telemovie than a full-length feature.
Skoonheid (2011)
Interesting idea, poor execution
I agree largely with ottoman-umpire's comments. Each scene lingered 10-15 seconds longer than necessary. Sometimes less is more, and certainly in this case I felt that throughout the film. Had it been better edited, it could have built the tension more effectively in a decent 60-minute film.
That would also have allowed the addition of a more satisfactory ending. When I saw it, you could almost hear every member of the audience saying to themselves "Is that it?" when the film ended - no resolution, no punishment of Francois for what he had done, no indication of what Francois was thinking/feeling as he watched the gay couple at the end, and whether he learned or grew as a result of what happened (i.e. character development). The movie didn't show him to have any redeeming qualities (in my opinion) so in the end I was hoping he would either be punished for the rape or at least come to grips with his homo- or bi-sexuality and do something positive about it.
Also, as Christian was a law student, I thought it likely he wouldn't let things rest and would either go to the police or try to blackmail Francois to get the money he wanted (he may have done, but the purpose of the money in the last scene is not stated).
All in all, an interesting but frustrating experience.