I had big expectations for this, the cast, the Director and a story like this, how could i not have? And...
Well it is far from meeting my expectations, but it's a good film overall.
The ensemble cast is amazing, and give great performances and the story is breathtaking. The screenplay isn't perfect, it could have done something more with the characters, something to make them more complete,and in the end you feel like there's a great beginning and ending but its missing a great middle. It's definitely missing something, the whale for instance, you never feel like there's a satisfying goodbye.
But the film is very interesting, and thrilling even if it just contents with being OK, rather than reaching the huge potential of an epic tale like this, that seems rather less epic that it definitely is. But what really fails? The director!
How a director like Ron Howard made so many wrong decisions is astonishing. The hue problem i had with the film, is its style. The camera movements for most of the time seem like were made by a drunk running. And then someone just had a huge day of fun, throwing every effect possible to make sure you couldn't see a thing.
Most of the time, the scenes are just extremely close ups, or the camera is placed in such weird places you only rarely see a normal shot. Then there's a game of focus and the acknowledgement of the camera, its the sea so they thought it would be a good idea to throw flares all over the screen, splash tons of water to the camera, and manny more effects like this, which makes almost impossible to see a thing, especially in the action scenes.
And on top of that the in many scenes it seems like they shot the film right in front of the sun! The shots they think are amazing are actually terrible, and you never get a truly great shot of the whale. There are rare shots that are beautiful, but the cinematography is one of the worst i've seen. There's tons of potential on a tale like this to make haunting visuals, and the action scenes are really great and thrilling, it's such a shame you cant see them properly. There's such a great film under all that visual style.
The sound is just perfect, as is the production design and production values overall, there's a very rich world and vistas, the special effects are great, but many times the cinematography just wastes them. The score has its moments, but is far from being what this story deserves.
Overall there's a greater film that the sum of its parts. The ensemble cast and the story being the best of the film, which i can't love because of its style decisions.
Well it is far from meeting my expectations, but it's a good film overall.
The ensemble cast is amazing, and give great performances and the story is breathtaking. The screenplay isn't perfect, it could have done something more with the characters, something to make them more complete,and in the end you feel like there's a great beginning and ending but its missing a great middle. It's definitely missing something, the whale for instance, you never feel like there's a satisfying goodbye.
But the film is very interesting, and thrilling even if it just contents with being OK, rather than reaching the huge potential of an epic tale like this, that seems rather less epic that it definitely is. But what really fails? The director!
How a director like Ron Howard made so many wrong decisions is astonishing. The hue problem i had with the film, is its style. The camera movements for most of the time seem like were made by a drunk running. And then someone just had a huge day of fun, throwing every effect possible to make sure you couldn't see a thing.
Most of the time, the scenes are just extremely close ups, or the camera is placed in such weird places you only rarely see a normal shot. Then there's a game of focus and the acknowledgement of the camera, its the sea so they thought it would be a good idea to throw flares all over the screen, splash tons of water to the camera, and manny more effects like this, which makes almost impossible to see a thing, especially in the action scenes.
And on top of that the in many scenes it seems like they shot the film right in front of the sun! The shots they think are amazing are actually terrible, and you never get a truly great shot of the whale. There are rare shots that are beautiful, but the cinematography is one of the worst i've seen. There's tons of potential on a tale like this to make haunting visuals, and the action scenes are really great and thrilling, it's such a shame you cant see them properly. There's such a great film under all that visual style.
The sound is just perfect, as is the production design and production values overall, there's a very rich world and vistas, the special effects are great, but many times the cinematography just wastes them. The score has its moments, but is far from being what this story deserves.
Overall there's a greater film that the sum of its parts. The ensemble cast and the story being the best of the film, which i can't love because of its style decisions.