joel-87474
Joined May 2015
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joel-87474's rating
The trailer looked a bit dodgy, but I just wanted a mindless action flick to turn my brain off after work. What I got instead was a fairly fresh take on a tired trope, at least up until the final scenes. Even within the guardrails of the Boy Becomes a Living Weapon to Seek Revenge subgenre, it manages just enough fresh takes to keep the viewer engaged. Some of the plot twists are fairly predictable, but others are too bizarre to anticipate.
The boy is deaf and mute, and has few (and unreliable) memories of his childhood. Because he can't remember what he himself sounds like, for his inner monologue he adopts the voice of the video game he was playing, the last time he can remember being happy. Fans of Archer (and Bob's Burgers) will appreciate H. Jon Benjamin providing the voice of our unreliably narrator.
The story trots along at a brisk pace, never apologizing for it's surreal and implausible storyline, nor taking itself seriously. This continues until almost the end of the movie, when it devolves into a typical Kung Fu punchup which substitutes gore for invention.
One is left with the feeling that the movie they'd been enjoying up till this point has suddenly taken ill and been replaced by its understudy. Or that they only had 10 minutes of screen time left but also several buckets of fake blood they didn't want to go to waste. It doesn't ruin the experience, but it's a bit of a letdown.
The boy is deaf and mute, and has few (and unreliable) memories of his childhood. Because he can't remember what he himself sounds like, for his inner monologue he adopts the voice of the video game he was playing, the last time he can remember being happy. Fans of Archer (and Bob's Burgers) will appreciate H. Jon Benjamin providing the voice of our unreliably narrator.
The story trots along at a brisk pace, never apologizing for it's surreal and implausible storyline, nor taking itself seriously. This continues until almost the end of the movie, when it devolves into a typical Kung Fu punchup which substitutes gore for invention.
One is left with the feeling that the movie they'd been enjoying up till this point has suddenly taken ill and been replaced by its understudy. Or that they only had 10 minutes of screen time left but also several buckets of fake blood they didn't want to go to waste. It doesn't ruin the experience, but it's a bit of a letdown.
They should've stuck with the leaner, smarter ending in the novel, because boy was I sick of Bradley Cooper's overacting by then. Ironically, he's playing a character who's repeatedly told not to buy into his own hype, when he needs that lesson more than Stanton Carlisle ever did.
Everyone else is competent at least. I thought at first that Rooney Mara was miscast, but she's playing a very different Molly Cahill from the novel, and does so effectively. Most of the cast are too old for their roles, but I can overlook that. It necessarily deviates from the novel for length, complexity and the practicalities of filmmaking, but also some arbitrary changes that are never improvements.
What's missing is the grandeur and spectacle that keep even del Toro's lesser films from being dull. There are good performances, good visuals, but nothing achieves greatness.
Everyone else is competent at least. I thought at first that Rooney Mara was miscast, but she's playing a very different Molly Cahill from the novel, and does so effectively. Most of the cast are too old for their roles, but I can overlook that. It necessarily deviates from the novel for length, complexity and the practicalities of filmmaking, but also some arbitrary changes that are never improvements.
What's missing is the grandeur and spectacle that keep even del Toro's lesser films from being dull. There are good performances, good visuals, but nothing achieves greatness.
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