Long Day's Journey Into Night

The first half is already pretty interesting, and then the second half I think is what makes this special. It's a crazy technical achievement, having one take that lasts nearly an hour, and to incorporate both a child actor and an animal into it was insane, if the old adage about not working with children or animals is to be believed.

But the first half shouldn't be discarded, as it contains some striking imagery and a few scenes that themselves are comprised of li takes (just not nearly as long as that final long take).

It's hard to say what this is about sometimes, and I think I began finding it more engaging when I stopped worrying too much about the plot. It works well enough as an experience - with its impressive visuals and the excellent and haunting music - to satisfy.

This film (which bears absolutely no resemblance to the well-known play with which it shares a title) is first and foremost an art film. Rather than containing a logical story, it is more about mood, tone, and memory. But it captures those things about as well as any film ever has.

It borrows a great deal from previous films in the art genre, including THE MIRROR as well as the films of Wong Kar-wai and Apichatpong Weerasethakul. So if you enjoy those kinds of films, this one is for you. It also has one of the best dream sequences of all time. Recommend for fans of Asian art films.

An unexpected gem, reminded me of early Wim Wenders or Jadorowsky. Obviously it's not a linear plot set in everyday reality, something that some reviewers seem to have not understood. It's metaphysical references resonate more and more strongly - mortality and transience, love and loss. It's disconcerting and haunting, very original.

I had a hard time following the first half of the movie, it felt more like shattered memories than cohesive story/narrative. It felt to long although it had it's moments like the karaoke part... Then that one hour long take came and it blew me away. The camerawork and visuals in this movie are astonishing, it added to that hypnotizing feeling of the whole movie. With few rewatched the rating might go up!

Caution...do not watch this movie if you're already sleepy, like I was.

I'd read enough about this film to know not to try too hard to understand it and just go with the flow. But even at that, I feel like I didn't figure out how to watch it until about the half-way mark....which is when the film's opening title appears on screen, if that gives you some idea about what to expect.

Those who become frustrated with this aggressively non-linear film may be tempted to dismiss it as a bunch of random disconnected scenes that don't add up to anything. Actually, I think the movie is very carefully constructed, using visual and thematic motifs (like apples, for instance) to connect one part to another. It's as close to a visual poem as you'll find short of an outright experimental film, where recurring images and sensations replace narrative storytelling.

It's a movie that I would probably get more out of by watching multiple times, when I can focus less on trying to figure out what's happening and more on the little clues dropped here and there to guide the viewer on his merry way. But here's the thing....this movie didn't pull me in enough the first time to make me want to put the energy into watching it again. It tries for dreamy, hypnotic, and romantic, but it only succeeded in being one out of the three for me, and there was something sort of coldly formal about it. Take, for example, the oft-mentioned final hour of the film, which unspools as one crazy complicated long take (and apparently was in 3D in the theater). It's impressive for sure, but it's also a stunt. I found myself paying attention to the technical considerations that went into pulling it off rather than anything really happening on the screen. And the whole movie is kind of like that. It didn't leave me puzzling over its enigmatic mysteries. It left me wondering "hmmm....wonder how they did THAT."

Grade: B+