Wreckers

Dictynna Hood's film 'Wreckers' tells the story of a seemingly happy marriage put under stress when the husband's rather intense brother pays a visit. The strange character of the visitor turns out to be rooted in a dark family past and the deeply ambiguous nature of the relationship of the siblings both to each other, and to the place where they grew up. The film captures the awkwardness of human interaction well, but struggles a bit on motivations: the inside of the husband's mind remains closed to us, and a pair of unlikely sexual encounters each just happen. Perhaps telling the tale from the perspective of the relatively normal wife is the error here, but although the subject material is highly emotive, I struggled to connect with the story at an emotional level.

All is not as it appears. Quite a dark movie with character clues that need a bit of studying. Overall a film that held my attention, though the volume of the dialogue was way too low at times. Would be almost impossible for any not familiar with Brit accents.

The premise was good, the actor did a great job, but i don't know.. i feel like something's is missing. And the ending... it's suffocating me. But I do like the tone and how slow the plot goes. I'm such a sucker for slowburn indeed. I watched this because i want to know more about Benedict Cumberbatch and it's a good beginning.

A dialogue dependent movie, but unfortunately the producers were too cheap to provide subtitles for non-Brits around the world who have different English dialects; or those with little or no English; or those hard of hearing viewers. To make matters worse the audio levels as well as enunciation by the actors were inconsistent and uneven.

The acting was minimally acceptable given there wasn't a whole lot going on throughout a film that has the camera obsessed with looking at walls inside the house or out the window. The camera continued the preoccupation with focusing on non-essential scenes for prolonged periods e.g. chickens in a coup; figurines on a shelf; tree leaves blowing in the wind; pond lily pads; spider crawling up a window; the inside of a church both with/without singing.

Outside of that there is a sleepwalking visiting brother; two brief sex with someone else's partner scenes and a party.

Maybe this is a day-in-the-life storyline?

"Wreckers" is a small, odd movie, the type of film that Benedict Cumberbatch made before films like Star Trek Into Darkness, War Horse, etc., came-a-calling.

The film stars Claire Foy as Dawn and Cumberbatch as David, a young couple who return to where David grew up in order to start a family. They are both teachers and have a cottage on the edge of the woods; they seem very much in love. Then David's brother Nick (Shaun Evans) arrives. Nick has been in the service and is suffering from terrible PTSD. He sleepwalks, he has screaming nightmares, he breaks everything in sight, he leaves the door to the hen house open so the family dog can kill the chicken. He's disruptive. Though Dawn suggests that he talk to someone, no one pushes the issues, makes it a condition of him staying in the house, or gets him to a hospital.

Nick's arrival brings up some other issues. Dawn was unaware that her husband grew up in a violent home; she probably was also unaware that he came from the working class, as he's fashioned himself into a well-spoken teacher. As time goes on, she finds out David wasn't honest about something else, which makes her question who was responsible for what regarding the boys' behavior growing up, as both men tell her something different.

I had some big problems with this film. First of all, I use closed captioning -- occupational hazard, I did transcription for many years and it did a number on my hearing. I have to say the person who transcribed the dialogue of "Wreckers," if possible, has worse hearing than mine. On the worst day of my life I knew more of what was being said than the captioner.

Secondly, the film was done in a way that I refer to as "precious." Long, long pauses where people say nothing. Also, many of the scenes, including a critical one at the end, were done in pitch blackness. PITCH. I was staring at a BLACK screen. My last problem with the film is that had I been Dawn, I wouldn't have stood for Nick being in my house for one night, let alone as many as he seems to have been there.

All that aside, the performances are excellent. I am an unabashed and unashamed fan of Cumberbatch and here, he is top-notch. One absolutely has no idea what is true about his character and what isn't, as he plays against what we're told or what we see time and again. He creates a fascinating, multilayered character.

The end of this film is deliberately ambiguous -- actually it was a little too ambiguous for me.

"Wreckers" is a story about re-invention, the lies one tells to one's self, and therefore to others, and the dark side of human nature. In the end, we don't know the answer to one very important question about one of the characters; and we don't know what the future will bring. But I think on that last point, we can guess.