noble-zone (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} noble_zone) wrote,@ 2009-05-17 22:08:00 |
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Brothers Bloom -- a review kind of
Saw Brothers Bloom while experiencing an earthquake... but I don't think I was affected too much by geologic vengeance.
My one sentence review: It feels like a parody of Wes Anderson movies.
For something with greater verbosity:
With BB, the filmmaker wants to have it both ways. He wants to create a comical fable about brotherly love, con artists and crazy-fun characters. At the same time, he wants to give all this a big emotional impact.
He fails.
Too-broad characters and the con-artist genre prevent the audience from feeling for just about anyone here. The Magical Japanese girl Bang-Bang may be fun but she's an anime character that never feels like she belongs here. Ditto with "Diamond Dog" who's strangely comical but, utlimately, way too over the top. The Belgian, ditto part 2. They all felt like movie characters, impossibly strange, and nothing more.
Both brothers are terribly miscast. Ruffalo feels like he's stretching to play anything whimsical and Brody is as charismatic and watchable as leukemia. Rachel is smashing if only because the actress is so damn luminscent you can't help but root for her.
Since it's a con artist movie that winks at the audience you can't help but assume *everything* is a con and that pretty much undercuts our connecting with anyone here. Now throw in the forced whimsy the filmmaker throws at us and what results is a movie that feels very empty (this despite an attempt to cram emotional poignancy down our throat).
Dear Rian Johnson, go sit down with Quentin Tarantino and let him teach you on how to make a movie that commits to its own internal logic. Hopefully he'll show you how to do the same. But hell, didn't you do that already? I loved Brick. Upon seeing Brothers Bloom, I wish you had made a sequel to your first movie instead. This one is rather a mess.
Saw Brothers Bloom while experiencing an earthquake... but I don't think I was affected too much by geologic vengeance.
My one sentence review: It feels like a parody of Wes Anderson movies.
For something with greater verbosity:
With BB, the filmmaker wants to have it both ways. He wants to create a comical fable about brotherly love, con artists and crazy-fun characters. At the same time, he wants to give all this a big emotional impact.
He fails.
Too-broad characters and the con-artist genre prevent the audience from feeling for just about anyone here. The Magical Japanese girl Bang-Bang may be fun but she's an anime character that never feels like she belongs here. Ditto with "Diamond Dog" who's strangely comical but, utlimately, way too over the top. The Belgian, ditto part 2. They all felt like movie characters, impossibly strange, and nothing more.
Both brothers are terribly miscast. Ruffalo feels like he's stretching to play anything whimsical and Brody is as charismatic and watchable as leukemia. Rachel is smashing if only because the actress is so damn luminscent you can't help but root for her.
Since it's a con artist movie that winks at the audience you can't help but assume *everything* is a con and that pretty much undercuts our connecting with anyone here. Now throw in the forced whimsy the filmmaker throws at us and what results is a movie that feels very empty (this despite an attempt to cram emotional poignancy down our throat).
Dear Rian Johnson, go sit down with Quentin Tarantino and let him teach you on how to make a movie that commits to its own internal logic. Hopefully he'll show you how to do the same. But hell, didn't you do that already? I loved Brick. Upon seeing Brothers Bloom, I wish you had made a sequel to your first movie instead. This one is rather a mess.
