Reviews by johanlefourbe

I already saw this movie and, to be honest, I didn’t care much for it the first time around but I thought I might as well give it a 2^nd chance, this time, with subtitles. Sure, this movie was rather poorly received but since it was directed by David Gordon Green and since I was starring Sandra Bullock, I still wanted to check it out anyway. On top of that, I always had a weak spot for movies dealing with politics. Well, the damned thing was still rather weak but it didn’t bother me so much the 2^nd time around. It’s pretty obvious that they didn’t handle properly the interesting potential that this story had but I thought it was actually mildly entertaining after all. Eventually, what still didn’t work was the tone which was just too random. Indeed, it seems that they wanted to go for a dark satirical comedy but, to be honest, I’m not completely sure though. For example, when the main character first arrived in Bolivia, she kept vomiting all the time and, afterwards, she kept eating potato chips which turned the whole thing into some rather pathetic slapstick. Later on, they also gave a rather far-fetched bus chase. Obviously, it was meant to be another example to show how reckless and actually ‘fun’ the main character actually was but, eventually, what did this scene actually had to do with political campaigning? On top of that, the fact that the damned thing was rather pretentious probably didn’t help either. It’s too bad because it was actually based on an interesting documentary which I might check at some point in the future. Anyway, to conclude, in spite of its flaws, I thought it was watchable after all but there is no doubt that the whole thing still did feel like a missed opportunity and I’m not sure if it is really worth a look.

Since I really enjoyed ‘Her’, of course, I was really eager to check this other version. Well, this movie clearly had the disadvantage that I watched it afterwards and there you had the biggest limitation with this concept. Indeed, with this 2^nd movie, you actually basically get to rewatch exactly the same story so it could never have the same impact that the first movie had which seems rather unfair. As a result, you are constanty waiting to see when the 2 movies will converge again which is actually quite distracting. Anyway, it seemed that this movie was more straightforward than ‘Her’, but again, it might have had to do with the fact that I saw the other version before. Still, I was actually impressed by the fact that the recurring scenes almost never used the same shots and, in fact, they even had sometimes some different dialogues which was a really neat surprise. Basically, when you watch a movie, you always assume that what you see is actually what happened but, in this case, what you see is how the main character actually experienced these events. I know, it probably sounds really cryptic but if you watch these 2 movies, you will definitely get what I mean. Eventually, I hope to see ‘Them’ at some point as I wonder if a more conventional movie combining both point of views might not better work but, then, the whole concept would be lost. Furthermore, if you might become one entity while being in a relationship, when you break up, you definitely become 2 separate beings and to show this process was basically the main goal of this experiment. Anyway, to conclude, even though the whole thing was pretty gimmicky, I still enjoyed this concept and both movies were definitely worth a look.

It is another movie I was quite eager to watch for at least 10 years, probably even more. Well, I wish I could say it was worth the wait but in spite of its decent cult-classic reputation, it didn’t really blow me away after all. I mean, the damned thing definitely had some potential to become something great and I have to admit that it was not bad but I thought it was rather half-baked after all. Above all, the whole thing was quite messy. Indeed, it seemed at first that Todd Haynes didn’t want to deliver your average run-of-the-mill music biopic, so he went for a more original almost impressionistic approach which wasn’t necessarily a bad idea but, then, suddenly, the whole thing became much more straightforward. But then, they changed back again to the previous approach and the movie kept constantly switching between these 2 modes which was just rather awkward. Furthermore, the whole framing device to have the story told by a journalist was pretty weak. I mean, Christian Bale delivered a solid performance but I didn’t care much for his character and I wish they focused only on Brian Slade and Curt Wilde who were much more fascinating. On top of that, Ewan McGregor gave here one of his best performances and I believe that Jonathan Rhys Meyers had never been better than in this flick. Finally, even if I have never been into glam rock, this movie gave a very interesting look on this weird over-the-top but yet really creative music genre. Anyway, to conclude, in spite of its flaws, it was still a decent watch and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like this music genre. 

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but since I have a weak spot for Jessica Chastain and James McAvoy, I was quite eager to check it out. The whole point of this concept was to tell the same story twice from 2 different points of the view and, I can tell you this, after watching this flick, I can’t wait to see ‘Him’. Beside this concept, the makers took another interesting approach. Basically, in most of movies, you have very often the characters talking about stuff that they already know just to make sure that the viewers are up to speed. Well, that’s something that was completely avoided in this movie resulting in some much more realistic dialogues and characters. On the other hand, this approach did have its drawback and they probably pushed this idea too far. Indeed, as a result, the characters almost never had some straightforward conversations and instead they almost only talked about some anecdotes only thinly related with the actual story and, at some point, it became slightly frustrating . Furthermore, if the amazing Viola Davis managed to do so much with so little screentime, it was rather disappointing that Isabelle Hupert was again completely wasted playing another completely underwritten character in a US production like this one. On the other hand, Jessica Chastain, who remains one of the best actresses of her generation, was once again quite spellbinding to behold. Anyway, to conclude, in spite of its flaws, it was a solid drama and I think it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.