Haven

I saw this film at the world premiere last night at the Toronto Film Festival. It was a crime drama told in the non-linear style made famous by Tarantino. What really made this movie stand out from like-themed movies, was it's setting in the Cayman Islands. The culture of the Caymans is evident in every shot, every frame, and it give an entirely fresh perspective on subjects we've visited before.

Frank E. Flowers does a fantastic job of keeping the story coherent as we alternate between two timelines, set four months apart. The acting is strong and the entire film has a distinctive atmosphere.

The crowd seemed to love it, but then again, the entire cast was present and the audience was quite excited (especially by Orlando Bloom). Still, a very good movie. It seemed like it may have been a little long, perhaps ten minutes or so, but that really came from trying to establish the Caymanian culture, so it's understandable.

I just so it on DVD now.

An OK script goes to waste on 'inspirational' camera shots which are copy-cat & sloppy. The editing is so bad, there's little point to discuss it. While some of the acting is decent, the accent of the local Caymenees is hard to understand some of the time, and harder still to believe it comes off real. Some plot-lines are meant to be connected in a clever way, but we have seen too much of this before, and some parts are so generic-made it's painful. There is no promise from this film - no new actors, nothing to carry this film even to be a has-been; it is a never-was.

Hopefully, we'll see no more work from the makers of Haven.

It all boiled down to one Friday the 13th night.

Haven takes place in the Cayman Islands, paradise on Earth, with beautiful beaches, friendly people, and of course, being the ideal place to stash cash, ill gotten or otherwise, free from taxation. In its seedier side, to paraphrase from another movie, weed is the currency, openly passed around in nacho chip bags. This movie ditches the idyllic moments, to peer beneath the veneer, of hell on Earth instead.

I like movies which have many characters, each with their own objectives, but being led by unseen forces as they relate to one another, and events bring them to within striking distance. They might belong to distinct story arcs, but given the geographical proximity, their lives, their decisions and the consequences all become intertwined.

There are three clear arcs in the movie, but the characters involved flit seamlessly from one arc to the next. You have the corrupt businessmen looking to escape the law at Miami, an affair, a daughter who hooks up with drugs and the wrong company, a sly thief of sorts, two star crossed lovers, a hot headed brother, good friends, and gangsters. On its own, they could be short stories. But when narrative style takes on the fragmented, non linear approach to spice and disguise an ordinary story, that's what you get in Frank E. Flowers' Haven.

Perhaps what will put bums in seats is the presence of Orlando Bloom, though the M18 rating would have restricted his girly groupie fans here from seeing their cinematic idol on screen in a role which is similar to what Tom Cruise did in Vanilla Sky, sort of. He plays the role of the Romeo in the star-crossed lovers arc, as Shy, son of a fisherman, still figuring out the meaning to his life, and having a lack of ambition which worries his girlfriend Andrea (Zoe Saldana). Parental disapproval gets into play, and the rest is a spiral downwards for both lovers and their relationship. Some say Bloom's role is intense, but there isn't enough room for his character to justify that.

And sadly, that was just about the better story amongst the three. In reality, all three could have been extremely short, as the scenes, though intercut with each other and had some overlapping moments, don't really contribute much to the characters or stories. You could have cut off half the fat, and still the story would hold water. One saving grace would be the score and soundtrack though, accentuating the illusion of paradise.

But this is not to say Haven's a really bad movie. It just had enough story elements to cruise along in auto-pilot, and in the process offer nothing groundbreaking stylistically, or earth shattering in having any twists and turns to the plot. Breaking up and juxtaposing a linear plot does not disguise the fact that it inherently needs a lot more oomph.

First let me explain my rating-system. I consider a 5 a movie that's somewhat watchable, a 6 is already a good movie. I gave Haven a 3 because the soundtrack was good and the acting wasn't horrible. Now over to the bad stuff...

I wouldn't recommend this film to anyone. Usually in my reviews I try to say something like: 'this movie isn't recommended for people who don't like slow-developing plots' or 'it's not for people who want the plot wrapped up neatly in the end'. But I can honestly and objectively say this movie was just one of poor quality. The biggest problem is the plot itself. The storyline is multi-linear, characters are being followed and they're all supposed to be connected in one way or another through an event or multiple events. Examples of brilliant use of this method is seen in Amores Perros, 21 Grams, Crash and Magnolia. In these films the story lines have similar prominent themes and the characters are all connected physically. Every character adds more elements to the story until we have a complex web of story lines, constantly crossing paths and having effects on one another. I know this sounds confusing but watch Amores Perros and Crash and you'll know exactly what I mean. Haven makes one fruitless attempt after another to be clever until all we end up with is an unsorted mess of scenes thrown together in a wanna-be movie. That's the best way to describe Haven: it wants to be a lot of things but ends up being rubbish.

The thing that irritated me even more then the gimmick mentioned above was the chronologically scattered framework that was used. I feel like they realized the plot and characters of their attempted intelligent film were overly simple, and they tried to jazz it up with a chronologically scattered framework to fool people into thinking they're watching something clever. I heard the story was chronological at the premiere of the Toronto film festival and then they re-edited the whole film to create the flashbacks. That's not the way to write a story with a scrambled up chronology. You have to actually write the script like that (with chronology switching from the start of your story) or the storyline will be a mess. The storyline has to flow naturally, even if you use chronology like that. A prime example a brilliantly written script that uses the same technique is Memento. The technique used actually adds something to the suspense of the story.

Nope, don't waste your time on this. I usually only write IMDb reviews for films I like but this film was just too dreadful for words, I felt it was my duty to stop another human being from seeing it. I don't see why anyone should see this movie. It's certainly not to be entertained and I hardly think anyone would be enlightened after seeing a film like this.

3/10 and I'm being generous.

The story is not exactly impressive but correct crafted.

The slick manner to tell the story represents the basic good point of film. Reasonable acting, good job of Orlando Bloom, interracial romance and some drops of Romeo and juliet, Cayeman stories and a ball of destinies .

Difficult to define it more than an ordinary thriller but the good intentions and part of nice work of director are good reasons for not define Haven as waste of time.

Indeed, significant part of story is reduced at sketches, well constructed or, more exactly, enough for a not bad work , offering to viewer kicks to reflection, in honest - precise way.

In short, decent film.